


Who Knows (what could happen)

by Chromi



Category: One Piece
Genre: Additional Warnings In Author's Note, Brothels, Canon Universe, Canon-Typical Violence, Crew as Family, Drinking, Drunken Shenanigans, Falling In Love, Family Dynamics, Gen, Hijinks & Shenanigans, Jealousy, Long, M/M, Mutual Pining, Non-Explicit Sex, Other Additional Tags to Be Added, Past Abuse, Pre-Canon, Rating May Change, Retelling, Self-Esteem Issues, Slow Build, Slow Burn, Survival, Swearing, World Travel, filling in the blanks
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2020-05-03
Updated: 2020-12-06
Packaged: 2021-03-01 22:07:04
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 5
Words: 72,385
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/23984281
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Chromi/pseuds/Chromi
Summary: For as long as he could remember, he had wanted to set out to sea as an adventurer. His father, unfortunately, dictated that he was to follow the family tradition and become a doctor instead.Following a lifetime of hurt and sorrow at the hands of his family, he eventually breaks free and takes to the sea alone - determined to keep it that way. Fate has other ideas in store for him; fate crosses his path with Portgas D. Ace's, a brand new pirate.And what does he hate more than pirates?Nothing.Or: from Sixis to the Moby Dick - the lives of the Spade pirates.
Relationships: Masked Deuce & Portgas D. Ace, Masked Deuce/Portgas D. Ace, Portgas D. Ace & Whitebeard Pirates, Spade Pirates & Masked Deuce, Spade Pirates & Portgas D. Ace
Comments: 64
Kudos: 82





	1. Prologue

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> 15th Sept 2020 UPDATE: this work is based on the novels, not on Boichi's manga. Boichi did his own thing and wrote pretty much an entirely new story loosely based on the novels' events, which adds new things and takes away a lot of the more gentle aspects of the novel, including the truck-load of subtext. This fic is derived from the novels only.
> 
> \---
> 
> I've wanted to write this since October 2019. 
> 
> For six months I've played with the idea - and written a handful of random scenes - for a fic that expands upon the Spade pirates' journey. The novel offers very little but hints at a great deal, and I want to explore all of it. Deuce's difficulties with his self-worth and his love for Ace; the suggestion that there's more to Mihar than we know; Skull's hilarious joining of the crew; the daily antics of a bunch of damaged individuals who are taken in by the most hurt of the lot.
> 
> This won't be a short fic. This is going to range from fun to angsty to pining to downright miserable in places. It will go from Sixis right up to Ace joining the second division of the Whitebeard pirates. It is also endgame Ace/Deuce.
> 
> In the prologue and first chapter, the issue of starvation/dehydration/exposure is dealt with and addressed more thoroughly than in the novel, including the effects of said conditions. This includes: dehydration-induced delusions, the physical effects of the conditions, and Deuce with a really short temper lol.
> 
> The first chapter covers and retells a lot of the first chapter of the novel. If you don't want spoilers before reading the novel, perhaps don't read this just yet.

_Come gather, children, settle down_  
_For I've a tale to tell_  
_Of the Pirate King, old Roger Gold_  
_The devil clawed straight from Hell._  
_You may have heard his name before,_  
_I see you're all nodding at me,_  
_Well, listen close and hold these thoughts of_  
_Terror, of plundering at sea._  
_Roger stood above them all,_  
_A man of such fearsome wit_  
_Who sailed to Raftel, now promised land_  
_With his gang of vulgar misfits._  
_He threw the world to panic, chaos_  
_With promise of the One Piece,_  
_Now reigns - thank god! - a calmer time_  
_Brought only by the decease._  
_But rest not, my little ones,_  
_For Roger's soul still roams!_  
_If you play up, you misbehave,_  
_He'll pluck you from your homes!_  
_A pirate's life is vain and bereft,_  
_They have no love in their hearts,_  
_They take the wicked, vile and cruel_  
_The stupid, but not the smart._  
_So fill your heads with knowledge, all,_  
_Let me witness great things from you_  
_So each and every child I see_  
_Avoids joining a pirate crew!_  
_You wouldn't want to tarr your name_  
_With sin so ripe and bare,_  
_So knuckle down forthwith and learn_  
_Else you'll be the pirate's heir!_  
_For years ago, precious lambs_  
_There was rumor of a child,_  
_A child whose mother was never found_  
_Neither at sea, sand, mountains, glen wild._  
_But search they did, they checked all due_  
_Each woman with him may have been –_  
_Was she ever real? Did Roger pass along_  
_His genes with a woman unseen?_  
_Alas – we know not! We can only but hope_  
_That a monster lives not among we,_  
_Else the slaying, the blood, will have all been for naught_  
_If it escaped and allowed to live free!_

* * *

A grand adventure, it was supposed to be.

One that he had dreamt of endlessly since the moment he had opened Brag Men, a book roughly shoved into his chest as a child by the man who would unwittingly set him on his way later in life. Not the way that the man in question wanted, mind; quite the opposite, in fact.

A grand adventure. Like in the adventure books he had poured over endlessly in his youth and well into his teens before and beyond Brag Men – books that he had been forced into hiding when he was deemed too old to still be reading them. Children’s books, they had been called. Stuff of fancy to enchant young minds and engage their imagination. To help children cultivate a mind that was sharp, witty, and bright. Not to be believed in past the age of puberty; certainly not to be handled like sacred text and secretly stashed under the bed of a medical student many years later, crammed between tomes of anatomy and beginner’s radiology.

He liked to dream. It had been a gift when starting out in life. Yes, he could remember well how the other children would join him in his make-believe games of witches and wizards, of heroes and villains, of bad, evil pirates and good, brave marines. How, when he joined his first school at the tender age of four, the name _Roger_ had been hissed like a dirty fungus that had taken root between teachers and pupils alike, cementing the name of the late pirate king into innocent, delicate minds as something _wrong_.

 _Roger_ had always been the baddie of the games. Whoever was picked to play _Roger_ was the class’s odd one out of the week. Funny, really, how children went through cycles of favor, how they would so easily pick and choose and reconcile with whoever they weren’t interested in week to week to day. How when, one miserable, heart-breaking week, _he_ had been singled out to play _Roger_ during recess.

Like the others – like a good little boy, always filling his role _well_ , he was quick to boast when Father drew doubtful – he chased his classmates, fingers curled like claws and growling fiercely. When he caught someone, they became a pirate with him, mind warped and misguided by the fearsome pirate king, and they, too, would chase and hunt down their pitiful prey.

Still, though, it had moved him to tears in the privacy of his bedroom each night of that week, sobbing into his pillow in silence, shoulders shaking and stomach cramping with the effort of remaining undetected. _I’m not a pirate_ , the small boy of five had whimpered into his sodden pillow, into his palms, _I’m not bad. I’m not weak._

Not a pirate, no. Never a pirate.

And yet that little boy had grown up with a love for the sea in his heart, with the desire to venture out and away like the brave explorers in his books. They were distinctly different to pirates, he was apt to firmly remind himself on occasion. These people were brave, striking out on their own with a thirst for knowledge and a need to see the world set firmly in their minds and hearts. Pirates? Oh, pirates set sail for riches, for glory, and for _power_. Pirates were like _Roger_ , the evil man who had given all normal adventurers a bad reputation, had, since his death, turned their names into laughing stocks. Why, even simple fishermen at the port could no longer work without at least one snide comment here and there, locals loudly debating whether or not they were about to fall victim to the pull of gold and silver.

But not he. Not he.

He craved – he _yearned_ – for the cry of the gulls. For beaches stretching further than the eye could see, for lands he could scarcely understand and ways of life that made little to no sense.

And for all of this – above all else, the most imperative – was to achieve this life completely alone.

Well, he had succeeded, in a manner of speaking.

He had certainly, undoubtedly, set sail on his own, like his much-admired adventurer who had penned Brag Men. He had begun his new life just as he had painstakingly planned, and just as he had waited and debated and stressed and worried over. He had even armed himself with a notebook solely for this journey, one bound in soft leather and treated with something expensive that would prevent the sea air from damaging it too much, so as to become the next grand adventurer of the East Blue. He would document his findings, his discoveries, just like the author of his Bible, and he would have the time of his life doing so.

Because this was what life was about. This was what he had dreamed of for as long as he could remember. The push to act had finally come in the form of bad grades, in his father threatening to outright disown him if he didn’t do better, live up to his brother’s achievements, and get himself up to standards so high he could never hope to reach them.

Not to worry. He had turned the tables on him, had been the one doing the disowning. Hah! Not so clever now, are you, Father?

A brand-new beginning. A chance to be himself rather than what his family expected of him. No more was he to be the boy hiding in the shadows of an elder brother, nor the boy who cowered in fear of a father who had never loved him. He had cast it all aside four days ago, had run and escaped and refused to look back. All gone – name, status, occupation, and expectations. A chance at freedom; a chance to become who he knew he was supposed to be.

… The only trouble was that – and it was becoming a more pressing matter with every hour, in fact –he was stranded, he was without food or water, and he was definitely, without debate, dying.

So perhaps the grand adventure wasn’t off to the flying start that he had hoped and planned for.

But still, all things considered, death via a combination of starvation, dehydration, and hallucinating that the bleached skeleton beside him was talking to him were far preferable to killing himself under the pressures of becoming a doctor like his father and brother.

He was never going to be a doctor. He was himself, and himself only.

Whoever _he_ was anymore, of course.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Chapter one will be up tomorrow, if I can finish it! It's LONG.
> 
> Big thanks to Ariel_Lazarus for her unending support throughout this, and for encouraging me to not skip parts covered in the novels. Thank you so much ❤
> 
> Feel free to fill [my Tumblr](https://chromiwrites.tumblr.com/) inbox with prompts, nonsense, or anything at all! I love to chat TT
> 
> Comments and kudos let me know if I'm doing something right, and I always love your feedback!


	2. Sixis: Part I

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> WARNING: this chapter has a lot of focus on starvation and dehydration and their effects. This includes auditory hallucinations and some disturbance to thought patterns. If any of these are serious triggers for you, then don't read (and don't read the novel, because this is based on that).
> 
> This chapter - and the first quarter of the next chapter - is an expansion and deep look into Deuce's time on Sixis. It expands on things merely hinted at, and adds what I think could have feasibly happened.

His stomach hurt so much. Throat, too. Lips. Skin. Hands. Chest. Everything.

 _So this is what it feels like to die_ , he thought bitterly, dull gaze caught absently by two gulls flying overhead. Their cries reverberated within him, shook something nostalgic loose from the depths of his memory. His first time visiting the seaside, perhaps, in the arms of a nanny who was later to be fired for treating the little boy to ice cream and seafront games. What kind of person _didn’t_ do such things when on vacation at the beach?

 _Dying_ felt very much like surrendering, something that he had decided with all his might that he was going to stop doing once this journey began. But it wasn’t like it was by choice, was it? It wasn’t like he was sat here on the brilliant white sandy beach of Sixis, almost three days into total starvation because this was how he _wanted_ to begin the adventure.

Still, though, all things considered, at least he had a companion to share this dreadful turn of events with.

Even if said companion was very, very much dead and had been for quite a substantial amount of time.

The skeleton beside him had seemed remorseful when he had first approached it, the thing all alone and bleached by the sun, forever left to gaze out over the ocean that had stranded it as it had then gone on to strand him. For this, he at least knew, even if he knew little else of the skeleton’s identity or story, was how its final chapter had come to close.

There was no doubt about it. The poor individual had come to the island for the same reason as him – for what other reason was there? – looking for the rumored treasure that the locals and beyond whispered of. _The treasure of Sixis is highly coveted, lad_ , he had been told as the map to it had been slapped into his palm by the toothy trader, _but ye won’t find it. No one ever has. Ye’d be a right fool to go lookin’ for it, too. No one comes back alive from Sixis._

 _Really?_ He had asked in mock amazement, eyebrows raised. _But if no one ever leaves, how does anyone know there’s treasure there?_

The trader had shooed him off with that, muttering something about _wiseasses_ as he had left, snickering to himself.

Oh, he had thought that only the simpletons, the ill-informed, wound up stranded on the most beautiful of islands in the whole of East Blue. Yes, definitely, only new sailors and dumb-as-shit pirates would fall prey to the current that surrounded it. The thing was well-documented, painstakingly laid out around the intricate drawing of the island, littered with warnings and all sorts of advice not to approach and to stay well away.

Again, he had laughed to himself as he poured over the thing in his tiny, one-man craft. If no one returned alive, how had the island been plotted? How did anyone know just how bad this freak current that circled it was, if no one escaped to pass on their findings?

He was going into this prepared, and he would come out alive with tales of riches and adventures like never before.

Only… unfortunately for him, the warnings were _right_. On approaching the island his craft had been destroyed, most of his luggage lost to Davy Jones, and he had been barely able to drag himself ashore and break down into furious, bitter tears. On the plus side, at least no one had been around to see him lose control like that, fisting the white sand and throwing it at the sea in a fit of hysterics.

So yes, all in all, he understood exactly how his skeleton companion had come to pass, here, under what was unmistakably a fruit-bearing palm tree that bore precisely zero fruit. He knew why the person had died not in a desperate struggle against the elements or on the cliffs in search of food, choosing instead to see one last beautiful sunset. How blissfully romantic.

There was nothing here. Nothing, and no one. Just him. Just these bones.

He looked at them yet again, dry eyes inexplicably drawn as if he expected them to offer some semblance of hope.

“All that’s left of you are bones when you die, huh,” he croaked, throat ragged with the effort. “Makes life seem kinda pointless.”

How long had it been since he’d last said anything out loud? Probably not since the screaming fit he’d thrown on that fated first day. Or – wait, yes, that was right – he had taken up narrating his journey around the island after that, keeping himself sane by focusing on the plants he found, the huge, white-fronted cliffs in the middle of the island that he skirted around, and the shapes of the clouds when it became miserably obvious that there was nothing else left to document. The notebook remained in his bag on his back, one of his scant few belongings to survive the flinging from the craft, its owner too ashamed of his own stupidity to begin documenting the start of his _grand adventure_.

“You’re a smart one, aren’t you?”

The words were ringing, yet they seemed to originate from within his mind more than from anywhere physical. He didn’t startle as a result, but looked instead to the skeleton, confident it was that which spoke.

“What’s that supposed to mean?” He replied in thought, lips too dry to try speaking out loud again. The skeleton would hear him, he knew, so it was all good. He ignored the nagging sensation that talking to skeletons in your mind wasn’t the most regular of activities, but at this point he couldn’t care less.

“It’s sarcasm, idiot,” the skeleton wheezed, “means you’re actually scarily stupid and you just haven’t realised it yet. Ignorance sure is bliss, isn’t it?”

He didn’t have a comeback for that – or at least, nothing sprang to mind quickly enough for him to retort. Instead, he irritably flicked some sparkling sand in the direction of his companion, keeping his focus on the gulls overhead as best he could.

Blinking felt like a chore. His heartbeat in his ears alternated between heavy and slow, rapid and shallow, indicative of the poor muscle working harder and harder to keep his body alive. Inside his brown leather gloves his fingers were chilled despite the heat of the day.

Shutting down already. It was fascinating how quickly the body gave up on life, and yet how hard it equally fought to sustain it.

“You listenin’ to me?” The skeleton demanded, and he let his head roll on his shoulder to look at the wretched thing. “Didn’t think so. Look at you, you’re a wreck! How’re you gonna come back from this, pal? You got a plan hidden in that coat of yours?”

He huffed a humorless laugh, dry and brittle. “I’m sorry,” he thought, although he certainly didn’t mean it, “but I don’t liaise with pirates.”

For the person had definitely been a pirate – there were no two ways about it. Their clothes, tattered though they may be, were stereotypical pirate garb. A pistol still sat in its right hand, coated in sand now but glinting in the sunlight, right beside an elaborate, beautiful jewelled ring on its middle finger. Completely useless trash, all that.

The thing snickered wheezily, although he did have to wonder _how_ a skeleton could wheeze, given its lack of lungs. “’Fraid you do now, sonny,” it drawled in his mind, the tone ever-changing to fit with the image that he was fast building of the person it had once been, “seein’ as all you have is me.”

In his borderline delirious state (and it _was_ borderline, thank you very much), that was all the convincing he needed to engage the thing further. “And all _you_ have are gems and weapons,” he pointed out, frowning. Damn, it hurt to frown. “Was it worth it in the end? Were gold, silver, and possessions worth losing your life for? Seeing as you can’t take any of that on with you.”

The skeleton hummed, stalling, maybe. “What do you think?” It asked. “Do you think I look happy? Fulfilled? Nah, of course not,” it chuckled along with his barked laugh. “ _On_ , though. That’s an interesting concept, isn’t it? _On_. Where do you think I’ve gone _on_ to, sonny? Am I not still here talking to you?”

He didn’t want to get into this with the voice of a dead pirate in his head. “You avoided my question,” he thought curtly. “Was that intentional?”

“Yes.” He could almost imagine the skeleton nodding if he squinted just right.

“Why?”

“Because you won’t like the answer,” the skeleton sighed, and again, he wondered vaguely just _how_ that was possible… quite overlooking that none of this conversation should have been possible in the first place. “If you don’t like the answer, you’ll stop talking to me. If you stop talking to me, then that’s it for me. Ain’t no one out there to remember this old set of bones.” That was rational, at least. At least extreme dehydration and hunger left him with _some_ modicum of rationality. “Still, though,” its tone took an upswing, a beat in its voice stepping into dance, “it’s all come to a rather abrupt end, hasn’t it, lad?”

He wanted to ask for whom, but knew the answer already, so stayed quiet through the laughter echoing through his frazzled, exhausted mind.

“What’ve you got to live for now?” The thing continued. “Surely you’re aware that only death awaits you. That’s why you’re here, ready to die just as I did.” He glanced down at the pistol in its hand again and immediately wished that he hadn’t, for the skeleton’s next words were cold and thin. “There’s still a couple’a bullets in it, if you’re wondering.”

“I figured,” he thought flatly, eyes travelling up to examine the skull properly, more closely than he had bothered to before. That puncture straight through the right temple put to rest his previous assumption that the pirate had slipped away peacefully in its sleep.

“Didn’t work out for you, did it,” the skeleton said, sounding pleased with itself, “this whole striking out on your own lark. You’re mad to think you could do something like this alone. Completely mad! You need _people,_ sonny! People are what keep us going, make it all worth it in the end!”

“And where are _your_ people?” He retaliated, sneering. “You’re here alone too. They left you to die, didn’t they? They found a way off this godforsaken spit of land and left you.”

This wasn’t the case, and, had he been a little more lucid, he probably wouldn’t have been so needlessly callous. Then again, had he been more lucid, he wouldn’t be telepathically talking to a skeleton in the first place. Whatever he knew – whatever he could assume from the evidence surrounding this skeleton and from the immediate vicinity – it, too, had come to Sixis very much alone. It had lived and died a greedy person, looking only to line its pockets with fabled treasure and never let another soul in on the findings.

Filthy. Despicable. Every last one of them.

“That’s what people are like,” he continued when the skeleton, surprisingly, didn’t interrupt, “they’re all only out for number one. Well, y’know what?” His voice grew stronger in his mind, his resolve tightening. “So am I, now. I’m here for me, where no one can stop me.”

“You mean,” the skeleton said delicately, the voice suddenly far closer and _real_ in his ear, making the skin on the back of his neck prickle uncomfortably, “where no one can hurt or control you anymore.”

And then, quite without warning and as sudden as a light being flipped off, the voice was gone. He tried to call it back, attempted to goad, then plead, then resorted to grunting a rough, “oi,” at the skeleton out loud, but… nothing. The moment had passed and, like it had said, now that it had spoken a truth that didn’t sit well with him, it had been banished.

Well, fine. No harm done there.

He sat in silence for a long moment, gaze flickering distractedly between his gloved palms and the glittering sea. It really was beautiful, that treacherous expanse of infinity. So startlingly gorgeous and peacefully serene to behold, its miserable truths so well hidden below the surface.

Lips sore under the sudden movement, he muttered, “what a mess,” to himself. Ah, what a mess indeed. Here he was, failed med student, failed son, failed brother, and now, failed adventurer. Who talked to skeletons. Blinking slowly, his eyelids feeling like sandpaper grating rough to his dry eyes, he looked over the pitiful pile of bones once again and felt, with an abrupt and nauseating rush of adrenaline, that he was looking at his own future a scant few feet away.

How apt! He wanted to cry but couldn’t muster the tears. His heart hurt for the unknown pirate, for himself. He was doomed. So completely doomed. It was too late to save himself, he knew with utter certainty. The longer he thought about it – the more he raked his gloved fingers through his unkempt hair and then twisted them together, the anxiety building – the more obvious it became. He really was going to die and become food for the gulls circling him way up above.

Ah. That was why they were there in the first place, he realised far too late. Shit.

Heaving himself to his feet, he coughed with the sudden exertion. “I’m such an idiot,” he said, noticing how words were starting to feel less foreign on his tongue with every passing sentence. “The least I could do for you is make you a grave.”

“A grave?” The wheezy voice was back again, causing his head to snap up and stare hopefully at the skeleton. “Sounds about right. Lay these tired bones to rest, kid.”

What were you supposed to say at a memorial service? He had never been to one, none of his family having died during his eighteen years, but he could vaguely imagine the kinds of words you might offer to the dearly departed. Really, though, this sort of ceremony should have been carried out by the pirate’s crew, or their family, if they still had any. It felt almost perverse, in a sense, for it to land on _him_ , a mere nobody in this pirate’s life, to say kind words so long after their suffering had come to an end.

The pistol glinted in the sunlight as he laid the bones as carefully as he could manage in his sorry state, the grave pitiful and shallow. He only hesitated momentarily before resolutely burying the pistol with its owner.

“I’m not a religious man,” he said quietly, marking the grave with a rounded stone that was nearby, “but if there is an afterlife, I hope you find peace there.” He paused, hands shaking in his lap, and then, against his better judgement, cutting clean through all his talk of _alone_ and _why would you ever need anyone_ , he added, “you don’t just leave bones behind on this good green earth; I promise you that. A sailor’s soul is never gone, provided there are still those to remember him.”

A line from Brag Men, penned by one of the authors after witnessing the death of someone he hadn’t been able to save. A loved one, he had always imagined it to be. A quiet sort of love that was nurtured, yet it tortured. A line that had brought him comfort many a time in the darker hours when pressures built and failures mounted.

He wouldn’t forget this pirate, he was sure. Despite never knowing them, they would stay safe in _his_ memory, at the very least. A funny notion for him, considering how he hated the lot of them with all that he was, but nonetheless... He could only hope that the pirate continued to live on in the memories of others, too. Others more worthy; others who had _known_.

And then the thought hit him like a slap to the face, crisp and painful as anything he could recall.

“Who will remember _me?”_ He said aloud, resuming his spot under the fruitless tree. God, his throat hurt. And his head, too. The world span wildly, dehydration fucking with him in ways he would give his left arm to stop right now. He bit the inside of his lip, misery building and swirling, chest cramping with the urge to cry, yet no tears welling. “When I’m dead atop your grave, who will come along to bury me with you?”

What a hopelessly romantic notion, he thought bitterly, almost laughing at himself. What a line that he would have, in another time, frantically torn open his notebook to record, stuffing it haphazardly into a short story about futile love that destroyed from within. Not like he had ever been in love, nor had anyone love him in return – his brother had seen to _that_ , all right – but still, could writers not dream?

The gulls cried overhead, anxious for their meal to succumb and die already. Maybe it was petty stubbornness that was keeping him alive at this point, happily denying the little bastards their feast.

His eyes drifted shut as he murmured a word of comfort to himself, letting the sound of the gentle pull and rush of the waves lure him back to a time where he was content and filled with the promise of adventure.

How long did he sit there like that in the shade of the palm tree? He had no idea when he was snapped awake, heart beating a frantic rhythm to his ribs, but the sun was still high in the sky, just as it had been when he closed his eyes.

There was something wrong. Something intrinsically _wrong_.

“Who’re you?”

The words startled him quite unlike the skeleton’s had done, cracking through him like a gunshot. These words weren’t within his mind. Or at least, he didn’t think they were.

Black boots crunched up to him in a world where there should have been no others. Raising his gaze up to meet eyes set in a handsome face full of freckles hurt, but he did it regardless. There, stood before him, thrown into shadow by the sparkling ocean behind him, was a young man, beaming down at him.

And his first and only thought was _oh great, now I’ve graduated from delusions to full-blown hallucinations_.

“Nice to meet you!” The hallucination said brightly, bending at the waist into a polite bow that was starkly out of place on such an uninhabited island. “My name’s Ace. I’ve been wandering the beach.”

No shit. Now his hallucination was naming itself.

“Hello, Ace,” he said in that same bright tone, false as Ace’s was genuine. His lip split and bled where it was so dry, talking having finally done a number on it. “I don’t have a name, and I’m _thrilled_ to see you.” He was not. Sudden inspiration shook him, and he was almost compelled to laugh. He held out a hand to his apparition, who looked politely puzzled by the gesture. “I’ve never shaken hands with a hallucination,” he said heartily, so insincere, “I’ve always had a theory that you’re like mist, though. You’ll disappear when I touch you. Lemme try!”

Ace reached out his hand as directed, smiling expectantly.

He confidently took it.

Ace was not a hallucination. Ace was solid, and real, and very much _alive_.

He was not proud to admit that he screamed from both shock and pure, unadulterated _relief_.

Only a little.

* * *

From the moment he calmed down enough to process what was really happening, his mind began to work in overdrive. His first assumption – one that he was bitterly disappointed in himself for leaping to – was that Ace was there to save him. Somehow, fate had directed Ace to Sixis for the sole reason of saving his sorry ass and taking him back to civilisation, food, and as much water as he could drink.

Unfortunately for him, however, Ace assumed the very same thing about him. Ace had, evidently, been on Sixis for _six_ days, twice as long as he had. Although still unsure whether he believed this or not, he decided to take Ace’s word for it. As they talked about Ace’s attempts at building boats and rafts that had all ended in failure, he couldn’t help but study Ace’s face closely.

Yes, there were signs of malnourishment about Ace’s face. His skin was obviously dry, peeling in places here and there, but not badly enough to obscure his prominent freckles. They were endearing, he found himself thinking, looking them over with rapt attention that Ace very clearly mistook for interest in his detailed account of the last raft he’d had smashed to pieces in the sea.

Ah, god, he hated this feeling that had settled over him. Really, desperately hated it. That flutter of hope, that _joy_ of seeing another person made him want to vomit, especially in light of the discovery that Ace was as woefully useless as he was in their predicament. He didn’t need friends. He didn’t need _nakama_ or any of those other cutesy terms that people liked to label each other with. Friends. Buddies. Partners.

Getting close to others meant ensuring you would be betrayed and hurt – cut off emotionally at the whims of the other party, left to rot emotionally and outright murdered psychologically. He wondered how Ace could possibly look at him as he was, even knowing that he was categorically not going to help him off the island. Ace’s deep gray eyes swam with something sickening with every blink in his direction, making him drop his gaze to the sand. Ace looked at him as if he _trusted_ him.

How? They’d known each other for all of ten minutes. He had already betrayed Ace’s hopes, as Ace had betrayed his. Granted, no, neither had done so intentionally, but the point still stood, didn’t it?

 _You can’t trust anyone_. You can’t. They _will_ hurt you. They _will_ take all that you are and burn it to charred remains of something whole. That was why he was alone; that was why he was going to remain alone.

Using Ace to get off the island would have been fine. That was different. Even though it went against his natural nature to help, to give, to _please_ , he would have simply used and then washed his hands of the chattery guy. Hell, that natural instinct to _care_ would have to be smothered under a metaphorical pillow too, before he found himself actually _liking_ the idiot—

Not that he did. Not that the more Ace prattled, the warmer his heart felt.

Just because Ace was the first person his age – or at least around his age, he couldn’t be entirely sure – who didn’t sneer and scorn with the hatefulness of his older brother ringing in his ears, didn’t mean that he was safe around him.

But ah, fuck, he was losing track of what was going on. Yes. Ace’s face. Definite dehydration and lack of food. The gaunt look was there, although Ace’s own peppiness was combatting it spectacularly. He had dark circles under his eyes and dry, chapped lips just like his own. Those strong, roughened hands of Ace’s shook as he gesticulated in his narration.

But his eyes. Those eyes that looked to him too fondly, clearly waiting for him to speak. They still sparkled with life, even though he knew his, by comparison, were dulled and deadened. Defeated.

He blinked, backtracking hard.

“What?” He asked, looking Ace over, tearing his focus away from his face. “I missed that last bit.” He had missed the _whole_ bit, but never mind.

“I asked what your name was,” Ace said, and he didn’t look at all put out to learn that he very clearly hadn’t been listening to a word he said. “I gave you mine, so it’s only polite you give yours, don’t you think?”

Polite? Ace wanted to talk about what was _polite_ in a situation like this? He fought to stop himself rolling his eyes.

“I’m not giving you my name,” he said irritably, looking away. Ace seemed to _shine_ beside him, seemed to radiate something cleansing, almost. It was disgusting.

From the moment he had set sail in the middle of the night, casting off and childishly flipping a middle finger back to his hometown, he had discarded his name. It was for the best; it was safest. From now on that was reserved for his memories, or possibly for people that he deeply trusted. Which, of course, was not going to happen again. And most certainly did not extend to Ace, the hallucination who wasn’t really a hallucination – the man who was here to save him, but actually wasn’t.

Ace pouted, brow creasing into a frown. “Why not?” He asked, leaning forward to try and catch his eye, but failing. “We’re friends, aren’t we?”

This time he didn’t succeed in restraining himself – he snorted, wishing instantly that he hadn’t, because _damn_ that hurt his nose and throat.

“Hardly,” he said shortly, massaging his neck.

But Ace seemed undeterred. In fact, his rejection only seemed to buoy him and increase his interest.

“C’mon,” he encouraged, almost whining, “tell me your name! Is it really embarrassing? Is it…” He trailed off for a moment before grinning, “is it something awful like Cletus or Eugene?”

He choked, almost laughing. “Do I look like a Cletus to you?” He asked hoarsely, his poor throat well and truly ragged by now. Ace just hummed a noncommittal sound, looking amused with himself. And then a thought occurred to him. A thought that was sure to throw Ace off the name nonsense and, hopefully, put a stop to this. If Ace was going to be insistent, then he was going to be every bit as annoying.

His head was _really_ hurting now.

“How about I give you a penname,” he suggested, meeting Ace’s eyes once again. Those bright, brilliant eyes that spoke of intelligence and passion far deeper and greater than his own. Fucker. “You know what a penname is, right?” Ace shook his head. He sighed in response. “Authors use them to hide their identity sometimes. I was thinking _Ace_ might be a good penname for a future story.” He watched him closely, taking a twisted, nasty sort of pleasure in how Ace’s cheeriness switched instantly to closed off irritation. On some level he should have recognised that mentioning his intent to write was revealing more about himself than was advisable, but that wasn’t important right now – winding up Ace was. “What do you think?”

Well, Ace felt very strongly about it, by the looks of things. Good. Hopefully if he irritated him enough, then Ace would leave him alone, and he could go back to peacefully dying on his own terms. Man, a slow death really did play havoc on his temper, didn’t it? He couldn’t remember ever having been this intentionally mean before. _Mean_ was reserved for his family, not him.

“Oi, wait, that’s my name,” Ace said, folding his arms, “you can’t have my name.”

“It’s only a penname,” he clarified, beginning to wonder just _why_ Ace looked so thunderously pissed off all of a sudden, as fun as it was, “anything would do. It’s not real.”

“Yeah,” Ace cut in a little too hastily, “but I’m gonna take my name to the top, make it known around the world, so you can’t have it too. Don’t you dare copy it.”

Ah. Yes. Of course. They had arrived at the reason why Ace was here. He knew why _he_ was there, why Sixis had called to his inexperienced ass and seen to it that he went and ensured his untimely death, but why Ace was there had remained a mystery. Naturally, he had assumed that Ace wanted the treasure too, but he didn’t give off that specific arrogant vibe that suggested he wanted it to become rich for the sake of hoarding money. There was something else at play here, and he was not liking where his imagination was now taking him:

Pirate. Filthy, god-forsaken, pirate. Probably.

“So did you find the treasure?” He asked, changing the subject without completely realising it, following his own train of thought. “The treasure that’s supposed to be on this island?”

“Do you know something about it?” Ace asked quickly, dropping the frown so suddenly that it alarmed him a little; Ace certainly recovered from things a hell of a lot quicker than he did, by the looks of things.

“Only the rumors,” he shrugged, not actually interested in discussing it, “only what you’ve probably heard, by the looks of it.”

Ace nodded, looking disappointed. “Strong pirates find and take incredible treasure,” he said, leaning back on his palms planted in the white sand, the gentle breeze causing his dark hair to whisper about his cheeks, “so as my first proper act of getting myself known, I thought I’d come get this one. That’d be so cool, right? Finding the treasure that no one else has managed to get. But…” he sighed dramatically, tilting his head to the side to shoot him a wounded look that was met with a contemptuous glare, “my boat got destroyed, I haven’t been able to find anything, and I can’t leave. Not a great start to my career, is it?” He laughed brightly, clearly, far too carefree for such an ambition.

So he had been right – Ace was a pirate, and a brand new one at that. No crew. No ship. No real direction other than a vague, unspecific goal. How does a pirate rise to the top? The top of _what_ , anyway? All he could imagine was surpassing the old pirate king, Roger, the man who had plagued the name of all good sailors just as much as he had pirates. Was that what Ace had in mind?

Before he could ask – and not that he _cared_ anyway – Ace piped up again, leaning forwards and clapping his sandy palms together.

“I got it!” Ace triumphantly declared. “Be Deuce!”

He blinked, startled, and licked at his dry lips before answering, “huh?”

“Your name! Your penname!” Ace was really excited all of a sudden, smiling as bright as the sun. “Deuce! Doesn’t it sound cool? It sounds like Ace, right?”

“Deuce?” He repeated, grimacing. Ace nodded encouragingly.

 _Deuce,_ if he remembered correctly, referred to the number two in dice or playing cards. The unlucky number. Bad luck. Not the kind of label one would want for themselves. He pondered, thinking – it suited his current situation horribly well, at least. And not only did it sound similar to Ace, it _was_ similar to Ace. Ace meant first. Deuce meant second. One and two. Linked.

His cheeks flushed at the thought of this, at the thought of the significance that a pair of names might carry for the people purposely bestowed with them. The act of naming another was inherently loving, romantic, even, for two adults to do. It was the granting of an identity, a whole life, in a manner of speaking, onto someone.

But Ace hadn’t said that.

As he frowned at Ace, he decided to clarify if Ace understood this connection, this link that he was trying to provide him with, and figure out if Ace _had_ been aiming for quietly intimate, or just blatantly stupid.

“You know what deuce _means_ , right?” He asked slowly, watching Ace’s reaction closely. “You’re aware of the links it has with the word ace, aren’t you?”

Ace giggled, showing all of his teeth. “Are there any?” he asked, “I just thought they sounded similar. Don’t you think they do? Deu- _ce_. A- _ce._ You hear it?”

Oh, he heard it all right. He heard a lot of unspoken things in that sentence.

He hated himself for daring to hope, to see something that didn’t exist. He mattered about as much to Ace as Ace did to him.

“Okay,” Ace said confidently, nodding, “from now on you’re Deuce. Would be a bit weird if we were both called Ace, after all.” So he _wasn’t_ going to drop that. “The only two guys on the same remote island, both called Ace…” He gave his head a curt little shake, hair haloing him. “Nope. You’re Deuce.”

Fucking marvellous. At least he only had to put up with it until either he or Ace died. Although, weirdly enough, it wasn’t altogether that bad of a name, ironically. Even without the meaning, it sounded good, rolled off the tongue easily.

When Ace stopped talking and paused to watch the gulls circling overhead, he was given the opportunity to reflect, to slow down and take a look at himself on the inside. While he couldn’t escape the effects of the dehydration and starvation, he found himself feeling… closer to normal than he had ever since becoming stranded. The conversation, while meandering and vaguely annoying, was a solid distraction from his present situation. It gave him focus – it gave him pleasure. Kind of. It didn’t stop Ace from irritating him, but, as he chanced a glance at his decently alive and real companion now, he couldn’t help but wonder if he had been sufficiently fed and watered, would he have felt so impossibly irked by him?

“I’ve been wondering,” Ace broke the relaxed silence all of a sudden, turning to match his gaze, which he promptly dropped, “and I hope you don’t mind me asking, but does everyone wear one of those in your hometown?” He nodded at him, gesturing. “Or was there a party or something?”

Ace was looking at him intently, eyeing up the dark blue mask that partially obscured his features. Not for the first time, he was forced to marvel at how it hadn’t been lost in the grand launching of his little boat, but he was glad it had survived.

“Can I touch it?” Ace asked hopefully when he didn’t reply quickly enough, leaning in eagerly.

He backed away at once, leaning out of Ace’s reach. “No,” was his short reply, feeling himself color once again and hoping against hope that Ace didn’t notice, “you can’t. And I just wear this out of necessity.”

“Is it to cover up a scar? A birthmark?” Ace pressed, looking genuinely concerned, the expression so starkly out of place that he almost caught himself laughing.

“No, nothing like that. I guess you could say I’m fond of it.”

“Great!” Ace was back to beaming wide, another idea having seized him, no doubt. “Then you can be Masked Deuce! Makes you sound like a hero or something!”

He groaned into his palms, slapping them to his face. _Why_ was Ace so endlessly _happy?_ How could he be so fucking _pleased_ about everything? Six days alone on this island? Really? And he was still this chipper? He needed to learn Ace’s secrets right now, because he felt on the verge of losing his mind.

“Don’t go giving me weird names,” he groaned, suddenly feeling acutely tired, “that’s the stupidest thing I’ve ever heard.”

“I can be very creative if I want to be,” Ace said with a touch of pride.

“This isn’t creative, this is awful,” he sighed. He wasn’t calling himself that. He would never, ever go by such a ridiculous title. Ace’s knack for dragging him into his pace, into his imagination and stories and everything that made him so unique, was exhausting in this state. Thinking back, he had never met anyone quite like Ace – never met anyone quite so _alive_. “Okay, listen,” he said, raising his face and meeting Ace’s politely interested gaze, “I only started wearing this the day I set out to sea. I want to keep my identity hidden, like I said.”

Ace cocked his head to the side, a small frown tugging at his lips. “Why’s that?”

“So if I run into trouble and, say, have an encounter with a marine,” he explained, “they won’t know who I am. No name, no face. Y’see?”

He wasn’t sure if Ace _did_ see. He just stared, perplexed, clearly thinking this over to the point where he wouldn’t have been surprised to see smoke issuing from Ace’s ears. Whatever he had said, it didn’t seem to compute with Ace to some degree.

The mask was something that he deemed to be essential for his new life. Wiping the slate clean. No name; no face. No past. No future. Just the here and now, sailing alone – that had been the plan.

The point had been, he had decided on finding the thing in a shop one afternoon after lectures, to cut off from everything that tied him down. His brilliant father, his perfect brother – how would they react if ever they knew what had become of the youngest son? What would they do if he got arrested for some reason, god help him, or ended up with a bounty and thus became public knowledge?

He wasn’t like them. He was the family failure, the disgrace. He alone had had his father hiss the words, “don’t even _think_ of embarrassing me,” throughout his life, usually accompanied by a firm grip on his wrist. _Don’t embarrass me. Don’t let them know I produced a son who failed._

Running away like this – because no matter how he rationalised it, dressed it up, and tried to pretend, that _was_ what he had done – was sure to see his father deny he had a second son anyway. It would give his older brother endless pleasure to be rid of him, although it did mean denying him the fun of ridiculing him openly to his peers, ensuring he was left friendless. Between them they had taught him well, hadn’t they? Between them, he had been raised to hate himself, to doubt others, and to project a perfect image at all times.

 _Well, look at me now, Father_ , he so desperately wanted to scream back at that man, _look what became of your disappointment._

He would probably be glad that he was mere steps from death.

But he explained none of these complicated feelings to Ace, and instead mirrored his frown back at him. At last, Ace seemed to make up his mind.

“I don’t agree,” was what Ace stated, folding his arms. What exactly was there to agree on? His choices weren’t fucking up for debate. “I can’t imagine covering up my face and hiding my name. There’s no honor in that. I couldn’t do what you’re doing.”

Well, good for him. He bristled, and this time, it wasn’t just minor irritation that pulled his frown deeper, nor curled his lip in the beginnings of a sneer. _Good for you, Ace_ , he wanted to say. _Isn’t it nice that you don’t have anything like this to think about_?

Instead he said nothing, biting his tongue to stop himself lashing out in defence. Ace probably had no mean intentions, he assumed, given that in the short time he had known him it was already so easy to tell that Ace was, well, _good_. Even if he was a newbie pirate.

“Look,” he ground out, noting the mild alarm with which Ace looked at him, “where I come from, everyone who sets out to sea is regarded as vermin. _Everyone_. Pirates, adventurers, anyone with a bounty for whatever reason… Is it not like that where you’re from?” Ace shook his head, staring at him so intently he vaguely wondered if he was about to burst into flames from it. “They’re seen as bad. People you shouldn’t associate with. Like, the locals can sometimes even go for the families of those who have chosen that lifestyle; it’s not unheard of for families to be stoned and beaten because their relative took off to fuck around at sea.” He fixed Ace with a hard glare, daring him to argue back. “Do you understand what I’m saying?”

“I see…” Ace murmured thoughtfully, dropping his gaze to blink thoughtfully at his boots. Then, with a gasp of understanding, he turned to excitedly declare, “you really care about your family, don’t you?”

He wanted to scream. He wanted to boot Ace in the face and bury him with that skeleton. Actually no, that wasn’t fair on the skeleton. No, he didn’t care about _them_ , the people who had taken his self-worth and strangled the life from it at an early age. _They_ had seen to it that he grew up a nervous wreck, forever shitting himself at the prospect of failure, of not being good enough, of not being loved. God, no, he didn’t care about them.

“Excuse me?” He asked coldly, looking at Ace like he was something disgusting. In that moment he _was_ , sunny smile and radiant personality included. Whatever warmth and comfort that Ace had provided was gone, replaced by something dank and foul.

“Yeah!” Ace said confidently, apparently not noticing how he now looked at him like he was something a dog had vomited up. “You’re worried you’re going to cause trouble for your family back home, right? That’s so admirable; you’re so kind-hearted.”

He was on his feet in an instant, unsteady and world spinning. He couldn’t stand sitting next to Ace after that—that—that completely _wrong_ assumption. How could he—how _dare_ he say something so—

“I _hate_ them!” He snapped, staggering back, footing wronged by the sand underneath. “If I cared about them, I’d still be home right now! I’d be in my room studying, not out here _dying_ and listening to you!”

Ace, strangely, didn’t seem at all put out by his sudden rage. He scratched the back of his head, giving him a quizzical look. “Really?” He asked mildly, as if they were merely discussing the weather, “oh, sorry, I was sure I had it right…” He grinned up at him, making no moves to get up or to drop the conversation. As his anger began to subside under the pull of fatigue, Ace spoke up again. “I’ve got a younger brother,” he said happily, as if this information would somehow cheer him up, “we aren’t related by blood, but I love him to pieces. He’s _so_ hyperactive. We grew up really close with each other, so being away from him now is kinda hard, actually… I really miss him…” And for the first time in the conversation, Ace looked sad. Genuinely, properly _sad_ , like the separation from his brother was harder on him than six days of no food or water.

And that was the last straw.

That, coupled with the fatigue, the hunger, the thirst, the headache, the pain, the relentless _pain_ of standing there under the beating sun, mind whirling and stomach cramping and everything building and building until he could cry—

Instead, he shouted. He yelled. He lost his shit and betrayed his own loneliness. His deep-rooted, longstanding sorrow as a boy who had never known the love and care that Ace so clearly shared with his younger brother by _choice,_ not even by obligation. That kind of care—that kind of _love_ was not something that he had ever known or ever _would_ know, he understood well enough.

What did Ace know of hardship? What did Ace know of emotional neglect, of psychological death at the hands of his father, of hatred and anger turned inwards? He had it all! He obviously had a home worth returning to, a family who loved him and hopelessly missed him right this minute. Maybe they were there now, sitting together, reminiscing over some dumb-shit nonsense from his youth? They were out there, holding him dear in their hearts, while here _he_ was, no doubt being scrubbed from the memories of his own family. He wouldn’t be surprised in the slightest if he were removed from their records for this, deleted from the family tree, and never spoken of again. Here he was, terrified of betrayal, and yet he was pulling the ultimate one on his family as a means of self-preservation.

He couldn’t stand Ace. He couldn’t stand people like Ace. Why was life this cruel? Why had he been dealt the shit hand when he had done nothing wrong? Because he was _Deuce_ , as Ace had called him. Well, Ace had been damn right about that.

It was childish; it was ugly; it was raw; but it was the little boy inside him sobbing, screaming, grasping for a life that he should have had himself.

How was it that they could be so similar – age, height, build – but have lived such entirely different lives up until this point? How was it that the universe had chosen to shove them together, of all people? He didn’t believe in fate, but if he had, he would have been vehemently cursing it right now.

And then, as his rant took a turn towards bitching about how Ace _must_ surely have loving, wonderful parents, he saw it. Ace’s whole expression closed down, darkening like a heavy cloud had drifted in front of the brilliant sun. But he didn’t care – why spare Ace any feelings when he obviously had plenty waiting for him at home? – and he turned on his heel, intent on leaving. He’d had enough of this. He’d had enough of facing the fact that his situation was dire and bleak.

But then… Ace spoke up, just loud enough to be heard over the crunch of sand beneath his boots.

“My mother’s dead,” he said, voice low and hurt, stopping him in his tracks.

Looking back at him over his shoulder, he knew he had hurt Ace deeply without meaning to, without realising that he _could_ with this topic. The pull to go back and apologise bit at him, that in-built nature to care and to mend (that he was desperately struggling to suffocate) trying to entice him back towards Ace and fix that broken sadness.

Instead, he coldly snapped, “your father, then. You’ve got one of those, haven’t you?”

Something _frightening_ passed over Ace’s features at that, and he knew without doubt that he had said something horribly wrong. What could there possibly be wrong _this_ time?

“He’s dead, too,” Ace’s voice shook as he spoke, and he, too, got to his feet to match his stance. There was no remorse in his voice, none of the numbing sadness with which he spoke of his mother’s passing – there was only anger, as plain as his own, taking the place of anything remotely _happy_ that had been there mere moments before.

But, again, instead of offering a word of comfort – instead of doing what instinct nagged at him to do and redirecting the conversation, as he might have done in a better frame of mind, coupling it with an apology – he dug himself deeper in this grave he was crafting himself, showing off his worst possible side to the only person who had called him his _friend_ in living memory.

“Well, at least you have happy memories of him,” he selfishly countered, turning to face Ace properly, noting how Ace looked like he was preparing for a fucking physical fight, of all things – shoulders hunched, fists balled, feet spread in a wide base… and he probably wasn’t even doing it consciously. “At least you, golden child, know what it’s like to be loved by a parent. You do, don’t you?” He offered a callous, mirthless laugh at Ace’s clear anger. “I grew up being berated by my father. Nothing was ever good enough for that man – do you have any idea what that’s like? What it’s like to not measure up, to be hated for simply being _you?”_

Of course Ace couldn’t. He took a sick, sadistic pleasure from knowing that he had _won_.

Only, of course, nothing ever played out in his life quite like he thought it should.

Because what Ace said next shocked him, knocked him completely off his course of assumption and turned everything upside-down.

“I don’t even know what my mother looks like,” Ace spat, lip curling in frustration, “I don’t have any happy memories of a loving home – not the kind that you seem to believe I have, anyway.” His fists shook as he squeezed them, knuckles turning white. “My father was a bad man. The worst. He…” Ace ground his jaw, the tendons in his neck jutting prominent momentarily, “he was a criminal, to put it simply. Not the kind of person who would raise a kid and play happy families.”

Oh, that was _perfect_. That stomped all over the homely image he had been imagining where an older version of Ace and some faceless woman sat together, adoring their freckled baby boy many years ago. Both dead. How long ago had his father died?

So then why did Ace look so _bothered_ by this? Still there was no hint of sorrow there in his freckled features like there had been for his mother – there was only anger; anger that was building, rising, rivalling his own as he himself simmered and cooled under Ace’s furious stare.

“Why’re you looking at me like that?” He challenged, bothered by it more than he should be. “So he was a criminal – so what? He’s dead now, end of.” Ace’s silence betrayed that no, it was not _end of_. “It’s not like it’s your fault he was bad, is it?” He tried, grasping at straws, and—yes, there it was, the tilt of Ace’s chin, the narrowing of his eyes, _daring_ him to keep going. Which he stupidly did. “Dude, whatever your father did has nothing to do with you. You’re not at fault. Let it go.”

Rich, coming from him.

Silence built between them, neither looking away, neither backing down. He paused in anticipation, watched how a dull, angry flush emerged to dapple Ace’s cheeks, his neck, his chest – his chest that rose and fell with heavy, angered breaths pulled through his nose. The last of his sunny aura had gone, dissipating under the swell of whatever was about to issue from him; he’d seen it enough times in himself, in his father, to know that an outburst was coming.

And then Ace took a deep, rattling breath and began, revealing a secret of the likes that he could have never, not even in his wildest dreams, have conjured up.

“You really think that absolves me?” He cried, taking a step forward. “You think that because I wasn’t alive or involved, that somehow spares me from his legacy? Do you have any idea what it _means_ to be the offspring of someone so heinous that even the mere mention of their name is enough to stop a person in their tracks?”

“Oi, what the hell—” he tried to cut in, bewildered, but Ace drowned him out.

“Would you still be spouting that shit if you knew _who_ he was? Would you excuse my existence if I told you that my father was the late pirate king?” Ace spat, his first real crude act where before there had only been politeness, and then sneered, misery dancing in his eyes, as he looked him up and down. “He’s the most god-awful man to have ever lived. Knowing I’m a part of that man makes me want to _die_. Every fucking _second_ of my life I’m haunted by his ghost – I can’t shake him off. So don’t you stand there and whine about your shit when you haven’t got a _clue_ what this feels like, deciding I have it made while you alone—you alone are the only poor bastard to come from somewhere rotten!”

This had to be a joke. This _had_ to be some kind of mad prank that Ace was playing, no doubt fuelled by their pitiful condition. Dehydration had got to Ace, and he hadn’t even noticed.

That had to be it.

“Hang on a second,” he said, finally calm in contrast with Ace’s fury, “you’re…” He shook his head but regretted it immediately as it made everything spin violently. “That’s not true. That can’t be true.”

But Ace didn’t say anything, just stood rooted to the spot, visibly shaking, fists refusing to relax, shoulders rounded and eyes dark. A thrill of panic shot up his spine at that look, and suddenly his doubt was lifted.

Ace wasn’t lying.

“You mean Roger?” He tried, disbelieving yet trusting his instinct – trusting Ace’s reaction. “You mean _the_ pirate king?”

Ace nodded – the barest of nods – and closed his eyes for a little longer than a blink. It was like watching his brain catch up with itself, he thought distractedly, like Ace was slowly starting to realise the magnitude of what he had just revealed.

This was not the kind of situation one would find himself lying in. He knew that. When it boils right down to it; when a person is on the cusp of death and teetering there with another, they will be honest and true. That was why he had raged and spat hatred for his family and his life so easily. There were no barriers out here, no social niceties to observe and uphold, regardless of Ace’s polite and sunny disposition. Honesty reigned in times of starvation – there was nothing to be gained from lying on Sixis. And, equally, there was nothing to be gained by pretending that Ace had the blood of _that_ man flowing through his veins.

As he tried desperately to figure out what the hell to say, an old song or poem, maybe, from his early childhood drifted back to him. One that a teacher of his had sung to the children scattered around her, perhaps one on her knee. A tale woven into a beat – a tale about the pirate king that ended with the somber reminder that a child had been believed to be conceived, but none had been found. This, his teacher had told the class, was why there were no children a year older than them in the school. A chilling thought to reflect on now, but one that had been a simple part of their lives back then, accepting whatever was fed to them.

_We can only but hope that a monster lives not among we, else the slaying, the blood, will have all been for naught if it escaped and allowed to live free!_

And yet here it was, facing him, wearing a face full of freckles and a vivid orange hat dangling from its cord down its back.

The monster that few believed had ever existed.

“Ah, shit…” He muttered, turning away from Ace again, “this is ridiculous.”

As he made to leave, knees shaking so badly he was in danger of collapsing, Ace spoke up, his old inflection back in place. “Hey, wait,” he sounded worried all of a sudden, “we should build a boat together—”

“Don’t talk to me,” he said, unable to muster the strength to inject venom into his words, “I don’t want to hear it. Don’t follow me.”

A cold kind of fury carried him away from Ace; one that shut him down rather than made him flare up like recalling his family did. He didn’t want to associate with the child of the man who had ensured that none at sea could ever have a peaceful life. Ace deserved to hate himself, as far as he was concerned – Ace deserved to die here on Sixis.

“But we’re friends now,” he heard Ace’s last attempt at stopping him, although it didn’t sound like he was following after him, “we need to look after each other.”

He grit his teeth together, focusing his energy on tramping back up into the thick forest that lined the beach, mind set on once again searching for water.

They were not friends.

Never.

* * *

All he thought about was Ace.

Ace and his smile. Ace and his unending optimism – that drive to keep building rafts and _live_.

Ace and Roger.

Ace, the son of the devil.

He didn’t know how to feel about it all. At first, once the shock had worn off, he had only felt anger. Bitter, selfish anger that he had always felt towards Roger was now being directed onto Ace, an innocent bystander in the shitshow that was Roger’s legacy.

No, not innocent. He was _Roger’s_ son!

But _yes_ , innocent – what he had said before, about Ace having nothing to do with his father’s misconduct and choices – was that still not true? He had certainly meant it when he had thought Ace’s father was just a regular old petty criminal, after all. What was the difference? Where did he draw the line?

 _I draw the line at the man who cursed me_ , he thought as he vigorously shook a spindly tree that looked like it had a bird’s nest perched on top. _The man who turned the whole world to shit. The worst man to ever live_.

It had been branded into the minds of every child growing up in East Blue, and, as far as he knew, all over the world: Roger was evil. Roger’s followers and sympathisers were evil, too. And it stood to reason that his child, if it existed, was every bit as sinful as his father.

But this raised questions that he was in no fit mental state to answer. This made him wonder how much truth there was to be found in such damning words. Did that mean that he was destined to be like _his_ father, for example? A cold, proud pillar of excellence who saw no problem in ensuring his son’s despair? He couldn’t stand the thought of that being true.

“I’m nothing like him,” he muttered to himself, trying another tree, “I’m my own person. I at least have _some_ capacity to care.”

_Then why not care for Ace?_

The intrusive thought was dashed away by an egg plummeting to the ground from the nest; he caught it, cushioning the fall well enough to prevent it smashing in his hands, and pocketed it, mood picking up slightly.

The problem, he believed, was not that he cared too little, but that he cared too _much_.

Either way, he didn’t want to think about it.

He wanted to keep shaking this tree and then eat.

He didn’t want to die.

If Ace wasn’t giving up, then neither was he.

* * *

The eggs did nothing to satisfy his hunger.

In fact, judging by the loud, miserable wailing that was now issuing from his stomach, the meagre meal had actually done more harm than good.

He ached. Everything ached, or hurt, or burned now. The ants that he had encountered after his dismal meal of three tiny eggs had been fierce, swarming him when he had unwittingly stepped on their nest like some big idiot who had no place in a forest like this. They had bitten relentlessly, and so, furious and stinging all over, he had done the only rational thing and bitten back. Handfuls of them. Crunching, swallowing, spitting them out when the acrid, foul taste overpowered him and hurt his tongue. Sweat mixed with saliva, and he had lashed out and punched the earth where he knelt, arm trembling something awful.

He didn’t even want to remember the weird, lumpy potato-like things he had found prior to the ants, and what had caused him to go stumbling through their territory in the first place. On touching what he thought to be a sweet potato to his mouth, it had turned numb and began to swell, only reducing when he had rubbed sea water into his face.

The only saving grace of the whole afternoon was the discovery that the white-faced cliffs collected fresh water – not sea water – on their faces. As he had removed and then shredded his shirt into rags to collect the water to drip into his bottle, he wondered how the hell he had overlooked checking out the cliffs for as long as he had.

He also wondered if Ace knew about the cliff faces. Perhaps he should tell him. But then Roger’s face – the one in the _wanted_ poster that had made its way into his school textbooks – swam into his mind’s eye, and he dropped the thought.

By nightfall, all he had collected was two large mouthfuls of water at best. It did little to assuage his thirst, and everything to dampen his spirits further.

Perhaps he deserved to die here after all.

It was like the island was telling him he shouldn’t be there. If he listened hard enough, he might hear it whisper _go home_ through the palm trees. This was not an island fit for one who had only known a life without survival hardships until now. He had never had to worry about where his meals came from, or whether he would be able to drink today, before this. That had been part of the pull, sure, but he had never imagined it would be like _this_.

What a miserable state of affairs.

“I’m sorry,” he whispered, running his fingers over the soil, “but I don’t have a home to return to anymore. You’re going to be my final resting place. Believe me, I would leave you in peace if I could.”

With one final pat he stood shakily, forgoing trying to build a fire tonight and instead bundling up as tightly as he could in his coat on the beach, well away from those hateful ants in the forest.

He never could start a fire anyway.

* * *

The universe spanned vast overhead once night fell proper, endlessly clear and brighter than previously. Or perhaps it was simply that this time he unconsciously tuned in to that eternal void, seeing his own expanse of emptiness mirrored back at him in that inky dark.

Whatever the reason, the infinite dusting of stars twinkling away merrily did nothing to improve his mood, nor did it abate the deep chill that gnawed at his bones. Nights on Sixis remained formidably cold, and no matter what he did, he once again couldn’t get a fire going. Yes, he had tried, even though he had made up his mind that he wasn’t going to bother – what was there to risk? Only his temper, apparently, given that he had lost it when the wood he had collected once again failed to light.

What was he doing wrong? Was it the quality of the wood that he found? He knew the theory of how to start a fire, after all, and it wasn’t exactly difficult…

But that was only one of his pressing concerns. Firstly, the shelter that he had built did absolutely nothing to reduce the cold, although it did help against the wind whipping the sand along the beach. The meagre scraps of food that he’d found seemed to taunt him, holding promise of nourishment and energy dangling over his head, and then failing to deliver when he snatched desperately for it. The cramping hunger only intensified, the thirst rendering his mind dizzier and cognition more disjointed than before. Every muscle in his body felt weaker than even that morning; every thought came slower, drifting in like clouds that he could barely see.

Hopelessness encroached, scuttling nearer like insects that reappeared no matter how much you sprayed the little fuckers. His chest tightened and throat constricted with the urgent need to cry, but, as ever, no tears came. Psychological or physiological? He had no idea. Maybe a combination of both.

As he huddled up in his coat on the freezing beach, arms drawn inside and hugging tight around his chest, he thought hazily of Ace over on the beach round the bend of the island, also alone.

Both alone. Even though they were both under the same vast sky, on the same frozen sand with the same sea breeze drying out their hair, their skin… Well, he had never felt quite so thoroughly disconnected from humanity as he did in that moment, and that really was saying something.

Maybe he should swallow whatever vestiges of pride he had left and go find Ace. Apologise. Set it behind them, if only for the sake of survival overnight. Ace had to be even colder than he was, if he had given up on raft building for the night now. A yellow shirt, knee-length shorts, and boots – Ace’s clothes couldn’t possibly be providing any warmth right now. Pulling his long coat around himself tighter, a shiver spasming up his spine, he was suddenly grateful that he had had the foresight to shred his already tattered white shirt to collect the water rather than sacrificing his coat.

Roger’s face bloomed into view within his exhausted mind once again, and he frowned at the gently lapping waves along the shore.

“I think I know what the problem is here.”

Had he had the strength to bolt upright and away, panic-stricken, he would have. That voice – that wheezy, confident voice of the skeleton – was back again, coiling somewhere deep in his mind and filtering effortlessly into the night. He lay perfectly still save for the relentless shivering, eyes screwed tight shut and lip bitten hard between his teeth.

“I buried you,” he hissed out loud after several long, tense seconds. Try as he might, he couldn’t stop his teeth from chattering, jaw aching with the effort. “Y-You aren’t here anymore. Leave me alone.”

“I was never here in the first place,” the voice pointed out gleefully, pressing in on a mind already so distressed and tired, “and yet we had such a _fun_ chat earlier this morning, didn’t we?” It snickered, apparently in tune with his flush of irritation. “But, yes, as I was saying: I’ve figured it out.”

On some level, he knew what this was – had always known what this was. Skeletons didn’t speak; voices didn’t pop into people’s minds unless there was some kind of interference with the brain. Severe dehydration, for example, could produce this, and oh, what did he have? Regardless, this insight did nothing to help get rid of the persona of the pirate skeleton.

“Figured what out?” He asked begrudgingly, whispering the question into the air. Talking gave him some imagined sense of control over the conversation this time around, and it stopped his poor head from spinning so badly. He didn’t want to engage it, but at the same time, it was company, wasn’t it? Needs must and all that.

“Why you can’t get Ace off your mind.” He could almost hear the grin in its voice.

Well, that much was obvious, wasn’t it? Didn’t take a genius to suss that mystery. “I don’t need a voice in my head telling me what I already know,” he snapped, refusing to open his eyes. Then, needlessly defensive, he added, “It’s because he’s that man’s son.”

“Is it, though?” The voice purred, and he realised with a jolt that this time, he _couldn’t_ think of it as the skeleton back further up the beach, currently residing under a pile of sand and a makeshift tombstone. The voice was very much the same, but this time it didn’t strike quite so… haughty, or friendly in an annoying manner. It was colder, closer, as if it were determined to make him face something he would rather forget existed. “Tell me, are one’s snap reactions their _true_ thoughts, sonny?” It snickered, too close to his ear – so close he almost forgot it wasn’t physically there. “Come now, you’re better than this. You know the true self lies behind the socially conditioned false self in all people. You _know_ that Ace isn’t accountable for Roger’s waste of a life.”

“Yes, but—”

“Your thoughts are plagued by Ace because you’re _lonely_.”

He bit through his lip.

His eyes flew open, focusing on the waves dancing and sparkling under the light of the half moon.

“I am not,” he growled, though it came out weak and feeble. “I felt no loneliness when I left my hometown. I was fine being alone before I knew Ace was here – and I still am!” He added when he felt the voice about to interrupt. He tried to sit up, to better face it head on (if that _was_ how you were supposed to face these sorts of things at all), but the world lurched violently and he gave up, heart racing. “I’ll do this alone,” he muttered, drawing his knees up as close to his chest as he could against the night’s chill, “I don’t need him.”

The voice hummed, and he was visited by the image of a faceless shape of a person stroking its chin thoughtfully. He could have laughed at the absurdity of it. “You speak of being alone so much – you hide every part of yourself from anyone who could hurt you – yet you’re having serious doubts about Ace. There’s something _different_ about him, isn’t there?” It wheezed a laugh that split into a nasty, devious cackle of the likes that shook him right to his core. “Oh _dear_ ,” it drawled, pleased with itself, “you’re positively _aching_ to trust him, aren’t you?”

“No,” he muttered tiredly, aware of how weak and shallow his voice sounded, as if he were summoning it from miles away rather than from his own body, “that’s not right…”

It wasn’t. It _wasn’t_. Recalling Ace’s smile didn’t pull at something deep down inside of him, beckoning his urge to try again, to see, to perhaps entertain just _one_ more person and see if he could get it right this time.

The blood running from his lip down his chin was tangy on licking at it, swallowing rough around a parched throat.

He hated this.

But the voice didn’t relent.

“You’ve convinced yourself that you want to dedicate your life to filling that notebook of yours with adventures,” it said silkily, delicate as frost upon a petal, “but what you _really_ set out to do was fill the void created by your family, wasn’t it? Oh!” It giggled cruelly, breathlessly, “what if what you want to dedicate yourself to lies not in exploration, but in something far more grounded?”

“Stop it—”

“What if,” it spoke excitedly, animatedly within him, growing in strength and rhythm to every beat of his tired heart, “what you seek is not the thrills of discovery out _there_ , but what you’re yearning to find in yourself, in others? You _want_ to prove yourself wrong about people, don’t you?”

“I’m not projecting my problems onto Ace—” he started, squeezing his eyes tight shut again, working as hard as he could to shut the fucking thing _up_ , but to no avail—

“Who said anything about projecting?” It laughed derisively. “What you want is someone good and kind… and what you’ve found is—”

“A pirate.” Hah! He had finally cut off its roll, its beat. “Pirates are stupid, and greedy, and selfish… they’re only out for themselves, all of them—” But that felt wrong. Utterly wrong. That statement had _never_ felt wrong before.

“Just like you,” it snarled, evidently irritated by being cut off, “ _just like you_. Did you not say you were only working in the interest of _number one_ from now on?” Its laughter returned, short and barked and reflecting his own, though horribly manic in nature. “Oh, now this is _delicious,_ listen to this—didn’t you acknowledge earlier that Ace means _one_? Beautiful. Outstanding. What foreshadowing.”

It was getting harder to breathe. The longer this went on, the more he felt like he was drowning with no way out, no means of escape, fantasising wildly of pulling the plug on a conversation that wasn’t even really happening.

“You’re faltering.” The voice was smirking; he could feel it. Pleased with itself again. Proud at how fraught he felt. “There’s no shame to be found in wanting to be close to others – that’s human nature. Don’t let it get to you, sonny.”

But it did. This whole conversation did. He wanted out, and he wanted it to end right now. Whatever this was telling him about his subconscious, about how his mind worked when shoved into the very real prospect of death, he didn’t want to deal with it.

“I’ll speak to him in the morning,” he tried bargaining with the voice, tucking his chin down into the neck of his coat. “I’ll go find him and… and we can talk it through.” If he had the energy to do that, of course. Even speaking now was getting harder, his words slurring the more he tried, black seeming to seep in at the corners of the world like water turning to ice.

“What do you hope to find there when you do?” The voice goaded, and it, too, was finally starting to sound a little fainter.

“I don’t know,” he breathed, the irony taste of blood still searing his tongue, “but you’re wrong, y’know. You’re so wrong.” He paused, but it didn’t interrupt. “Nothing he can do will make me want to leave here with him.”

Right as he was on the verge of passing out – right as his eyes rolled back and the world went numb – he was sure he heard that little voice hiss the words, “don’t be so sure, _Deuce_.”

* * *

He didn’t go find Ace in the morning, although it wasn’t strictly by choice.

The morning of his fourth day on Sixis was spent in what he would later document – and then delete – as a state of confusion.

He woke. He passed out again from the headache. He woke again. He crawled into the forest, having no idea what he intended to do or how to do it, only called forward by his entire body – every cell, every nerve, every last tiny fragment of him – screaming for food and water.

He passed out again before he got very far.

* * *

Afternoon.

Following his unwilling nap on the forest floor, he found himself able to stand and walk, thankfully. The hunger and thirst hadn’t reduced, but instead presented as an ache again rather than sudden bouts of randomly blacking out. After stopping at the cliffs to collect his bottle of water that he’d left overnight, he made his way down to the beach where he had left Ace, almost crying with the relief of finally having a reasonably decent amount of water to drink. The bottle was, blessedly, over half full of collected water, and he was able to talk himself into pacing through it rather than necking the entire lot and then probably bringing it back up. It did nothing whatsoever to combat the hunger, but it did reduce the dizziness just enough to let him at least see where he was damn well going.

When he eventually made it back out onto the beach, there, sure enough, was Ace. And – his heart skipped a beat at the sight of it – he had fashioned a tiny little boat.

Well, it sort of looked like a boat. It also sort of looked like a coffin, given its unfortunate shape and tall sides.

As he watched with mounting disappointment, Ace waded out into the sea, climbed in, and then, upon making contact with the hellish current that circled the island, was spectacularly thrown from his little craft. Said craft was never seen again, the poor thing dragged under like a massive sea creature had gulped it down. It was actually something to marvel at, now that he wasn’t living through the experience first-hand, how Ace himself didn’t get pulled under the current too, emerging soaking wet a few minutes later and muttering dark curses back at the sea.

There was a definite sadness about Ace that hadn’t been there before, he was reasonably sure. His eyes didn’t sparkle anymore, and he appeared like he was close to giving up. But still – and this was the startling part – he didn’t possess that haunted look that all people get when they know the end is near.

 _How?_ How was it that he could still hold on to some form of hope? He was confident that _he_ had had that look about him ever since he had first dragged himself ashore, sodden and hopelessly bereft.

It was now or never – his window of opportunity to go and speak to Ace, to put his subconscious at rest and shut up that nagging voice once and for all, was closing fast. Stumbling slightly as he went, Ace staggered away in the opposite direction to where he stood, apparently completely unaware that he had a spectator.

But his feet didn’t want to move. He stayed rigid, breath shallow, sweating under the mid-afternoon sun, as Ace wandered off.

So, filled with heavy regret, he did the same, turning on his heel and allowing his poor mind to refocus back on food, food, and more food.

Which, most unfortunately, made his stomach moan _loudly_.

… Which, most unfortunately, kicked his tired, wretched, paranoid state of being to turn its focus back to Ace…

… Back to Ace, who he had just observed to _not_ have that haunted, gaunt look that he knew without doubt he himself sported.

The all-consuming vortex of misery that accompanied starvation. The loss of one’s way. The inability to do anything, or focus on anything, other than the collection of food, the sourcing of food, the endless, ceaseless, monstrous longing for _food_.

He looked back to Ace’s footprints in the sand leading him off… where, exactly?

Things began to rapidly fall into place, and as he processed his evidence, his rationality started to take a back seat to each worrying new thought that paved the way for the next and the next.

Ace clearly wasn’t spending his time looking for food. Why? _Why_ was he wasting his time building rafts, when he himself had spent just about every waking minute scouring the island for food?

There was only one explanation: Ace had a food source that he wasn’t aware of.

That _had_ to be it. That was it!

The voice had been wrong; it had been _entirely_ and _embarrassingly_ wrong. Trust Ace? Fuck right off. Ace had access to food – Ace wasn’t sharing. Ace was perfectly happy to leave him to die because he was a _pirate_. He was Roger’s child. He wasn’t good at all – he was a liar, a trickster, a nasty little bastard who looked out for number one.

See? _See?_ He wanted to scream as he followed, pace slow, tread heavy, breathing hard and stomach aching. Did the voice not _see_ as he was seeing, understand as he was now grasping? His instinct had been _right_ , dammit, _right!_

He didn’t want to die. He didn’t need Ace’s false care, false kindness, false smiles.

He needed his food.

He needed—

—that huge piece of fruit that Ace was holding the moment he came into view again.

That—

He barely stopped himself from moaning in longing at the sight of it. It looked utterly perfect, simply delicious! Massive and orange, big enough to fill a starving stomach and take the edge off the insanity that had been plaguing him. Oh, god, Ace had been living off _those_ , hadn’t he? He had a store of them around here, right? There was no way he didn’t, for how else had he now survived seven days on Sixis? Seven days without the scummy fingers of Death closing in around his throat with every waking moment?

And Death caught up with him in that instant – not in his body, but in his mind. The idea of it. The impulse, one that would have been dismissed as intrusive and ridiculous at any other point in his life.

Well, needs must, right? _Needs must_.

The son of Roger didn’t fucking deserve to live, anyway.

He ignored the scream of protest that issued from the back of his mind, resolute and determined.

Using the last reserves of strength that he could muster, he bent and hoisted up a thick tree branch that lay nearby, arming himself.

Beat a pirate to death for his food? Sure! Why not? Only a pirate; only a scummy little piece of filth that no one would miss. No one but a brother back home – and what did he care, in that moment, of the trials and tribulations of a kid brother?

 _You’re wrong_ , some part of him argued as he advanced, panting heavily, shaking with adrenaline and anticipation. _You’re wrong about Ace._

 _I’ve been right this whole time_ , he snarled, sweat dripping into his eyes. _There’s no such thing as a good pirate._

No one would ever know he did it. No one could ever blame him if they did.

He was almost upon Ace – almost within striking distance – when he raised his shaking arm, ready to do the unthinkable—

When his—

—stomach—

—upon seeing that fruit so close—

— _howled_ in protest and longing, _screaming_ to be fed—

And Ace turned around, surprised to see him there.

“Oh, hey,” he said happily, eyeing up the raised branch. “Is this for the boat? Here, let me take it – it looks kinda heavy.”

“Ah, no,” he said weakly, his limit met, his energy fading in the face of being discovered, trickling away, bleeding from him to leave him shaking with the effort of simply standing, “it’s not for the—I’m—”

But Ace took it from him gently, looking at him with such genuine gratitude that he felt physically nauseous. With a thump he sunk to his knees, powerless to do anything. He _couldn’t_ do anything. He couldn’t take Ace’s life – he couldn’t take anyone’s, didn’t have that kind of ability in him whatever he had talked himself into. He had been a fool to even think that he could.

But then… Another distorted, dreadful thought took him, one fuelled by the way Ace stood over him, branch in hand, looking down at him with concern, with—

No, not concern.

Everything felt unreal; his head spun with hunger, exhaustion, _fear_.

He was going to pay for his lunacy, reap what he sowed, be the one to be struck and killed for having the _audacity_ to think he could ever—!

“Uh,” Ace said, blinking down at him, “you _did_ come to help with the boat, right?”

_He had been wrong all along._

Finally, at long last, after days of thinking that they had all dried up in the face of dehydration, tears welled up in his eyes.

And he _sobbed_.

He couldn’t speak. He couldn’t draw breath. He could only clutch at his face, let the tears roll messy and wet down his cheeks, and let it all out. All the pain. All the fear. All the sheer horror that now caught up with him, disgust roiling through him as he fully comprehended what he had been about to attempt to do. What had he been thinking?! What had he been _doing?!_ Who was he, a mere nobody, to be deciding the death of another? Of Ace? Of Ace, who was so good, so kind, as he had _known, fuck, he_ had _known this_.

Ace squatted down in front of him and dropped the branch.

“Hey, it’s okay,” Ace said gently, patting him on the shoulder, “everything’s okay. You don’t have to do anything you’ll regret.”

Which, if possible, only made him cry harder.

Ace _knew_. And Ace was still willing to try and comfort him through it. What kindness – what strength! What an immeasurable display of his true nature!

 _He_ deserved to die. He had deserved to die all along. Foul, rotten, cruel – _he_ was all of the things that he had decided to see in Ace, had projected onto Ace instead of addressing in himself because of something as meaningless as a title.

To add insult to injury – as if this situation couldn’t have been any more embarrassing and devastating on its own – his stomach screamed another pathetic groan, single-mindedly longing for the fruit that Ace still clutched in his left hand.

Much to his horror, following only a heartbeat of hesitation, Ace held out the fruit in front of him. “Here,” he said softly, in the sort of voice one might adopt to soothe a distressed infant, “you can have it.”

The fruit was distorted through his tears, but his stomach damn well recognised it. And, weirdly enough, so did Ace’s. His stomach gave a groan of its own, signifying that it, too, was completely empty, meaning Ace was in the same state as he was.

“Why?” He croaked, looking up into Ace’s freckled face at last, searching for an answer. “There’s more of these, right? You’ve g-got a whole hoard, haven’t you? That’s why you’re—why you’ve been—that’s why—”

But Ace shook his head. “This’s the only one,” he said in that same gentle tone, “I just found it. It must’ve washed up like we did. Lucky, huh?”

 _Lucky_.

With a howl of misery he buried his face in his hands, unable to look at Ace. How could he? How could he look at someone so wonderful _now_? This really topped it off, didn’t it? Ace was willing to give him his only food that he had every right to keep for himself.

Because _that_ was the kind of person that Ace was. Not some spawn of the devil, or a rampaging idiot who set sail under the title of _pirate_. He had been taken in by the opinions of others, of the messages and fear and hate instilled into him throughout his life. He had judged without knowing, had deigned himself fit to convict a man he didn’t understand simply because of his father. Ace was able to stare in the face of his own starvation and ignore it in favor of aiding another. _That_ was who Ace really was.

Was he really that shallow? He was so ashamed of himself; so utterly and completely ashamed.

And now Ace was trying to help _him_.

“You need to stop crying long enough to eat it,” Ace said, sounding strained, like he was trying to smile – and he had every right to be finding this difficult, goddammit, “c’mon, you’re hungry. You need to eat. You’ll feel loads better if you get this in you.”

But he shook his head despite how dizzy it made him feel. “I can’t,” he gasped, “don’t, please.”

He would repent for this. He would stay hungry and be grateful for it. He deserved it – hell, he deserved to be beaten to death for what he had attempted to do, never mind just staying hungry!

“Eat it,” Ace insisted, nudging it against his hands still shielding his face, “it’s fine, you’re not yourself right now.”

“Even so!” He sniffed, mortified that Ace could even _think_ of trying to defend his behavior. “I’m not having it!”

Ace sighed, exasperated. “You’re starving,” he pointed out the fucking obvious, “stop refusing already.”

“How can I when you’re in the same state?”

He at last raised his face – he was probably an awful sight to behold, covered in tears and snot and looking utterly pathetic – but Ace only looked concerned, albeit a little irritated.

“Okay, how about this.” Ace sat down properly, taking that comforting hand off his shoulder to grab up the knife secured to his hip. “We’ll split it,” he explained, holding the point of the knife to the fruit, “and we’ll have half each. You can’t refuse that.”

“I—” he started, but Ace interrupted.

“No,” he said, clearly meaning it, “half each.”

Ace stabbed the fruit at the top, carving it in two equal halves before deliberating momentarily and handing him the right one. Eyes trained on Ace’s face, he made no move to eat his portion, waiting for Ace to go first – there was no way he was going to take the first bite.

“I’m eating,” Ace said, quickly taking a massive bite out of his half, “see? I’m—ugh, this is gross, what the hell—”

And with that – with seeing that Ace was indeed eating – he lost his composure entirely, ripping into the fruit.

Ace wasn’t kidding when he said it was gross. It was the worst tasting fruit he had ever tried, but _god_ that didn’t _matter_. He was _eating_ at last, eating enough to properly fill his stomach, eating to bring back feeling in his fingertips, to restore him to _himself_ again and not this wretched thing that had taken over him.

He owed Ace his life, and he was sure he could never make it up to him for as long as he lived.

“I’m so sorry,” he sobbed between mouthfuls, gasping for air, “I’m s-so sorry, Ace, I don’t know what—what I was—I’m _so_ — _ugh_ , this is vile—”

Ace laughed loud, slapping him on the forearm genially. “But we’re alive, right?” He grinned, juice smeared all over his cheeks and chin. He certainly radiated life in that moment – life and hope given form. “Alive to see another beautiful sunset on Sixis. Aren’t we lucky?”

Again with that word. _Lucky_. Maybe they really were. Maybe he really was. Maybe this was what his life had been building up to, waiting patiently for the chance to meet and to know Ace.

Now _there_ was a romantic notion for his notebook.

They sat in silence for a long time after finishing their meal, stomachs placated and moods lifted sky-high. He felt giddy, energised by the simple act of being _alive_ , for the first time since reaching Sixis, here, sitting beside Ace.

He thought back to the skeleton buried round the other side of the island, knowing that he would never hear its voice in his head again. But it had been right about one thing… Ace invoked trust, and in Ace he _would_ trust.

“Pretty, isn’t it?” Ace asked, breaking the silence as he mistook his long, whistling sigh to be brought about by the sunset. “Something about watching it with someone else makes it all the nicer, huh, dude?”

He gave Ace a small smile, gaze flickering up to meet his. “Deuce,” he said, smile broadening as Ace’s eyebrows shot up and a smile of his own burst into life, “my name’s Deuce.”

He was no longer alone… in every capacity of the word.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> The next chapter sees a look into what life was like on Sixis once Ace and Deuce ate the fruit and started working and living together, and takes us through to them leaving the island. Sixis was the foundations of their relationship, so I believe it deserves a thorough, proper exploration. Chapter 2 will also be a lot lighter, given that there's no more starvation/dehydration to contend with!
> 
> Chapter 3 will be focused on how the two started up the Spades, and the hilarity of trying to work out life together.
> 
> Chapter 4 is Mihar's introduction chapter, and so forth etc...
> 
> Feel free to fill [my Tumblr](https://chromiwrites.tumblr.com/) inbox with prompts, nonsense, or anything at all! I love to chat TT
> 
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	3. Sixis: Part II

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> The Sixis chapters were supposed to be in two parts. However, my chapter two file's word count is currently at 22,000 so I will be splitting it further. Sixis will now be in three parts because I'm not done and I still have so much left to cover... I'm so sorry. I have too many words in me, clearly.
> 
> Huge apologies for the delay - if I had conceded sooner and accepted that the Sixis chapters would be in three parts, I could have submitted this chapter three weeks ago. That being said, though, I'm 7000 words into chapter three already thanks to this split, so the next chapter should be along much, much sooner as I intend to work on it pretty much daily until its done (because oh my god, I am so looking forward to writing chapter 4 and 5...).
> 
> Thanks for sticking with me, and sorry, as ever, for rambling ;;;

Deuce never wanted to forget the details of Ace’s smile in the moment he openly decided to wear the identity he had bestowed onto him. If there was only one thing he could take with him from this cursed (blessed?) island, it would be the memory of the finer points of Ace’s face on lighting up. Dazzling, he had been, like the sun bursting through rain clouds, blinding he who had been reborn again anew under his care.

… All right, so perhaps that was a _touch_ too theatrical and bordering on religious for an atheist. Nonetheless, Deuce mentally saved the description to later pen into his soft leather notebook.

Moments like this – sitting in comfortable silence with Ace, almost shoulder to shoulder (almost close enough to touch), senses awash with the tang of salt and sand alike – were meant to be cherished. Adored. Remembered forever and recalled in times of sorrow. Where the insatiable need to be cared about by another and to reflect those feelings back was finally, at last, addressed. The accompanying sense of calm was intoxicating, leaving Deuce a willing victim to the smile that refused to drop from his face. Belly full and heart fuller, sitting beside the man who he would now surely, gladly give his life for…

It was something so simple, the act of sitting beside Ace, yet it felt enormous within Deuce’s heart.

Breathing had never come so easily.

Was that why he felt so warm right now? Because Ace had set ablaze something hitherto unknown within him?

But, then again, maybe that was to be expected now. He had never sat next to someone who was as genuinely selfless and kind as Ace, had he? In fact – and this thought was interesting to say the least – _Deuce_ had never spoken to or known anyone _but_ Ace.

A huff of laughter caught him with this thought. Wondering what Ace would make of such an interpretation of what consisted as identity, Deuce turned his content smile away from the waves and round to his friend—

—and immediately cried out in shock, scrabbling away from Ace as quickly as he could.

Because Ace was on fire.

No, literally – Ace was on _fire_.

“Holy _shit_ ,” Deuce yelped, his long coat getting caught underneath himself in his haste, only just catching the open shock at his behavior dancing in Ace’s eyes, “Ace, you’re on _fire_! Look at yourself!”

He didn’t even have time to mourn for the loss of the tender moment that had held them mere seconds ago.

Mayhem reigned the moment Ace realised. _How_ he hadn’t noticed was something that Deuce couldn’t fathom – he was sure that _he_ would have spotted at least one of the swirling flames about _his_ body, but never mind – but when Ace did, to say he overreacted was an understatement.

With a shrill scream and a flurry of sand he was on his feet, slapping at his arms and stomach in plain terror, senses abandoned. “I’m on fire!” He cried, shrugging off his yellow shirt, “what the hell?! What’s happening?!”

“How did you _do_ that?!” Deuce screamed right back, hurling handfuls of sand at Ace to try and quell the flames, but to no avail – it didn’t seem to make the slightest bit of difference. “What did you do?!”

“I didn’t do anything!” Ace wailed. “Oh my _god_ , Deuce, help! Do something!”

I’m _trying!”_ Deuce shouted, panicking, “hold still—hold _still_ Ace, the sand should stop it—”

But Ace couldn’t stay still, dancing on the spot in terror, shirt thrown to the floor and body covered in pink handprints where he slapped to put out the spiralling flames. Nothing reduced them – if anything, the longer Ace flailed and the more Deuce moaned in terror, the harder the inferno seemed to rage.

“It’s hot!” Ace cried as the sand continued to do precisely fuck all for his predicament, “it’s really hot, Deuce, it’s—”

He stopped moving so suddenly that Deuce was visited by a brief moment of terror that the flames had actually killed him on the spot. But no – Ace was looking at his discarded shirt, a blazing arm raised over his head in mid-panicked thrashing, eyes wide and mouth open, confused and slack. Following his line of sight, Deuce looked to the shirt as well, and even though his vision seemed to have reduced to pinholes in his heightened state, he noticed—

“It’s not burning,” he breathed, stepping in closer to Ace, hands shaking with adrenaline, “and it’s not damaged.” He looked Ace over quickly, assessing, acutely relieved yet bewildered by what he found. “You’re… you’re not injured, either.”

And, now that he was able to get a good look at Ace instead of blindly panicking, Deuce noticed something curious. At first he was convinced that it was a trick of the mind, a product of barely just coming back from the brink of dehydration and hunger, but given that the fire was undoubtedly real, maybe it wasn’t implausible that _this_ phenomena was as well.

Because it seemed that somehow, rather than appearing to have _caught_ fire, Ace looked to have _become_ fire instead. His skin seemed to have almost transformed in places to actually _be_ fire, and, on inspecting Ace’s thighs briefly, the flames appeared to be one and the same with his shorts, rather than the material burning and smoking. In fact, now that he looked more closely and stopped screaming, Deuce couldn’t see any sign of smoke or soot about Ace or in the air around him.

“And it’s… _not_ hot,” Ace said, calming down remarkably fast, “it doesn’t hurt.” He blinked, watching the flames dance in his palms (as _part of_ his palms – Deuce barely dared to trust what he was seeing) before they diminished, then looked to Deuce for an explanation, clearly thoroughly confused. “What’s going on?”

“I don’t know,” Deuce confessed, thinking frantically, “there shouldn’t be any way for you to—” He cut himself off with a cry of understanding, pointing excitedly at Ace’s bemused face, then his own. “The fruit!” He exclaimed, smile spreading relieved while Ace merely stared, astonished, “it’s the fruit! It was a Devil Fruit! That’s gotta be it!”

“You’re kidding?” Ace whispered, “it was…?”

“Must be!” Deuce said, “here, let me try—”

Carefully, tentatively, ready to leap back at the first hint of pain, Deuce shed his gloves and took Ace’s hand in his own. On contact, with Ace every bit as reluctant to touch him as he was Ace, Deuce’s mind swam with elation, a thrill of excitement shooting up his spine as he gasped in surprise. Ace was right – it didn’t hurt, nor did it burn or exude heat.

“Nothing,” Deuce murmured, grinning at Ace, patting the back of his hand to prove his point, “can’t feel a thing.” The flames extinguished entirely at his words, most curiously. “This is _incredible_ ,” he gushed at once, flooded with that all-consuming wave of understanding that he had known only from textbooks and lectures before, feeling giddy and giggly out of nowhere for the first time in, well, forever, “I’ve never seen one before. They sell for ridiculous prices – higher than a hundred million, sometimes – and we just ate one without…” Deuce trailed off as Ace’s expression dropped, suddenly looking saddened and lost. Nerves prickled at Deuce’s skin, anxiously searching Ace’s face for an explanation. “What’s wrong?” He asked, hating seeing such a mournful look on the face of the one person he now cared about so completely. Worry shook him to his core when Ace turned those deep gray eyes onto him, searching his own walnut brown like he was trying to find the answer to an impossible question. “Ace? You okay?”

Ace took a second to respond, staring intently at Deuce, lips parted, thinking hard. “If that _was_ a Devil Fruit,” he said slowly, deliberately, “that means I can’t swim anymore.”

Realisation slapped a deep frown on to tug at his brows. Of course. Excitement and that natural thirst to learn about something new quite aside, Deuce had overlooked the obvious side-effect that was so well publicised. “Once you eat the fruit of the Devil,” Deuce recited from a textbook of many years ago, “the sea rejects you. You’ll be hated and cursed by it for the rest of your life.”

But was that true? Was that really the case? Deuce had no idea – he’d never met anyone who had eaten one, as far as he was aware. It was entirely possible that the whole _rejection_ line was nothing more than a myth that had been passed by word of mouth, changing with each exchange and becoming unrecognisable from the original message.

Ace, however, certainly seemed to think it was true. He nodded, mouth set in a hard, serious line. “Only one way to test if it _was_ a Devil Fruit,” he said gravely.

Deuce snorted a small laugh, raising an eyebrow. “Bursting into flames wasn’t enough for you?” He asked.

But, no, evidently not. Evidently, for Ace, turning into fire wasn’t quite enough to convince him that he now held the supposed powers of the Devil within him – for real this time, and not because of the label the world had given him for his father’s choices.

Because next moment, before Deuce could stop him or indeed do much in the way of reacting, Ace had turned toward the sea and started running flat out.

“You’ve got to kidding me,” Deuce moaned to himself, deliberating for a moment before following after Ace at a brisk trot. “Ace,” he called over the thrum of the waves, “that’s _really_ not a good idea!”

Sea foam splashed and sparkled around Ace as he waded through the jewel-bright waves, kicking up diamonds as he went. Distractedly, as if the thought pervaded his mind from an outside source planting a message, Deuce found himself momentarily mesmerised by the sight of Ace among the glittering droplets.

“See, Deuce?” Ace called happily back to him over his shoulder. “I’m fine! I don’t feel a thing! It wasn’t a Devil Fruit after all!"

His assertion stopped Deuce in his tracks at the shoreline, bent halfway towards pulling off his boots, watching as Ace waded out even further. Was that really necessary? Hadn’t Ace already proven his point? There was no sense in going deeper and tempting fate further – even if he could still swim, he would soon hit the point where the rapid current would snag him. Wouldn’t that be damned ironic?

“Ace, fine, you’ve made your point,” Deuce said, straightening up and abandoning removing his boots, “come back and we’ll figure out the fire.” Or, rather, draw an infinite number of blanks as to why Ace had spontaneously burst into flames. Maybe Deuce really _had_ been seeing things? That wasn’t an altogether unreasonable assessment, was it? Seeing as there was no way Ace could _become_ fire, after all.

“Thank goodness it wasn’t a Devil Fruit!” Ace continued, ignoring Deuce’s plea. “I’d be so sad if I… If… If I…”

Without warning he wavered, staggered a tottering step forward, and then collapsed bonelessly into the waves that swallowed him greedily, swirling and converging over him.

“Oh, for the love of—” Deuce sighed, disbelieving what he’d just seen, “what’re you _doing?!_ I _told_ you to come back!”

Ace, of course, didn’t respond – a few bubbles blossomed on the surface of the sea, popping in little arcs of foam.

His heart thundering in his chest, terror guiding him mindlessly forward, Deuce splashed out into the shallows to retrieve Ace. Jeez, wouldn’t that be fitting? The first person to ever care for him, and for him to ever feel he could trust – drowned by the force of the sea in a cruel act of karma (and maybe Ace’s own stubbornness. Just a little). A fine ending to Deuce’s first and only foray into friendship indeed!

Ace was heavy in Deuce’s arms when he located and hauled him up – a dead weight if ever he’d known one. Just as the books and whispers had detailed, once a person who had eaten a Devil Fruit came into contact with the sea, they lost all the power in their muscles and became weak and useless. Ace certainly _looked_ done in by the sea water, his head rolling back over Deuce’s arm, eyes glazed and unseeing, jaw hanging slack.

Feeling reasonably certain that there was a romantic connotation to be found in heaving Ace up into his arms bridal-style, Deuce slowly waded back to shore, immensely glad that he had found Ace under the water at all. With a grunt of exertion he laid Ace down as gently as he could, touching briefly to his chest to make sure he was breathing. Satisfied, Deuce grabbed up Ace’s discarded shirt from nearby and used it to dry his face, quite ignoring the fact that he himself had sea water streaming off him, coat, pants, and boats soaked through to his skin.

“Is anything you do _not_ dramatic?” Deuce murmured to himself as he patted and wiped. “Not that I have a leg to stand on, all things considered, but…”

Never in his life had he met someone who burned with this intensity. There was nothing _dull_ or _scholarly_ about Ace – nothing that his father would have called _proper conduct_ (aside, of course, from his impeccable manners). As he dropped his touch down to pat dry Ace’s shoulders and chest, Deuce found himself unable to tear his eyes away from Ace’s face, imagining what kind of upbringing he could have had. He doubted it could have been strict and rigid like his, whatever it had been, for Ace possessed fluidity in all that he did – a quality that had been stamped out before it had been given time to grow within Deuce.

And then, quite suddenly, those eyes refocused, blinking back up at Deuce before Ace rolled to his side and coughed up seawater.

“Oh,” Deuce stammered, dropping the shirt immediately and leaning back, flushing furiously, “sorry, I read somewhere that drying off seawater’s the best thing to do after—uh—”

But Ace didn’t seem at all interested in listening to Deuce rationalising why he’d been using Ace’s shirt as a towel. Sitting up, Ace looked at his hands and then back to Deuce, eyes bright and alert.

“You pulled me out?” Asked Ace, checking Deuce over with an appraising eye, gaze lingering on the steady drip of water from his bent elbow.

That much should have been obvious. “I wasn’t going to let you drown, was I?” Deuce started, but cut himself off as Ace’s meaning clicked into place. “Right,” he said, patting at his own chest in disbelief, “I’m… I’m completely fine...?”

“Even though we both ate half?”

“Yeah… Weird…”

Deuce, like Ace, was soaked, dripping seawater all over the sand and churning it up under his knees. However, Deuce, unlike Ace, had yet to burst into flames, and had also retained his strength in the sea.

“So I guess only the first person to eat a Devil Fruit will get the powers?” Deuce mused aloud, feeling certain that this was a detail for his notebook later on. Thinking about it, he couldn’t recall ever reading an account of two people sharing the same Devil Fruit before. They were so valuable, so expensive, that of course the buyer or looter wouldn’t want to share the possibility of the power with another – that much was a given. “Maybe we’re the first people in the world to share one?”

“Dunno,” Ace shrugged but couldn’t answer that question. “After that first bite,” he said after a pause, brushing sand off his shins, “all that’s left is a disgusting piece of fruit, huh?”

Extending his index finger between them, Ace frowned in concentration, freckled face tight. Then, as they watched, his finger transformed into a flickering flame, shuddering and swirling between their enraptured expressions. It was pretty, as far as flames went, Deuce thought. Something that one could get lost in if given the chance to simply sit and watch its dance.

“I guess that settles it,” Deuce said in awe, although for some reason he couldn’t bring himself to smile. Neither, apparently, could Ace, for he just held Deuce’s gaze when it shifted from flame to storm.

Ace’s brother, it transpired when Deuce offered to explain more about Devil Fruits, had eaten the Gomu-Gomu fruit and, according to Ace, was now made of rubber as a result. As Ace demonstrated his brother’s – Luffy’s – power by punching out a fist, Deuce found himself pleasantly surprised. Not because of Luffy’s power, as interesting as that was, but… because with this story came none of the accompanying jealousy that had previously driven Deuce to scream and spit hate in the face of Ace, a man loved by choice and not by blood.

Although, as he felt just a tiny flash of pride for not completely losing his head this time, Deuce also couldn’t help but focus on that one word that drifted into mind: blood. While Luffy most certainly couldn’t give a damn about Ace’s father, surely that approach didn’t extend to everyone else back home, did it? Had the people who raised Ace in the absence of his deceased parents _known?_ Had anyone? Surely _someone_ knew… right?

Anyone who knew Ace wouldn’t be able to judge him for Roger’s life; Deuce was now certain of this. No one could look upon another made of pure kindness and a heart open and full of generosity and still judge based on something as trivial as lineage. As he forced a smile to mimic Ace’s obvious glee from talking about his beloved brother, Deuce was visited by a rather unpleasant thought. If the wider public in Ace’s town hadn’t known (and they couldn’t have done, else Ace would have been executed for sure, the act spreading far and wide through newspapers and reports), then just what had he heard about Roger growing up? Nothing good, judging by his reaction to the mere mention of his late father the day before.

Deuce had never felt so desperately sorry for anyone in his life as he did for Ace in that moment.

Ace, however, misinterpreted his miserable expression.

“Yeah, exactly,” he sighed, lips pressing into a thin line, “while being the same as Luffy isn’t a bad thing at all, it really couldn’t have come at a worse time…” Ace cast his gaze out to the darkening sea, then, when Deuce didn’t respond, he added, “I can’t swim anymore. If the next boat I make sinks – which, let’s be real, is probably gonna be the case – then I’ll die. Shit’s not looking too good for me, is it?”

Honestly? It stung to hear that. It hurt to know that Ace appeared to be entirely unaware of the epiphany, the total understanding and flip of beliefs that Deuce had just gone through. Why, it sounded as though Ace assumed he would continue to be alone in his endeavours in leaving Sixis. It sounded like Deuce’s sobbed apologies, his insistence that Ace eat half the fruit, and then quite literally dragging him back from his certain death under the waves were not proof enough that Ace was now undoubtedly the only person who mattered in Deuce’s life.

Heat sparked between them in the growing darkness before Deuce could open his mouth to argue his case, Ace testing his abilities in the form of turning his whole fist into fire now instead of just his finger. Their shadows stretched long behind them back up the beach, silently dancing together.

Of course it was natural to worry – Deuce would have felt exactly the same had he been in Ace’s place. But no – if Ace fell in, then Deuce would follow within a heartbeat and haul his ass back to safety, no questions asked. If he himself fell then fine, whatever, he could swim back to the surface no problem, no harm done… Maybe Ace just wasn’t comfortable with putting his whole life in the hands of a virtual stranger who had just attempted to kill him, however laughable that attempt had been.

Ah, Deuce wanted to curl up and disappear, the shame was so great.

Instead, he watched those flames twist and billow, grow and calm. Ace had unwittingly become a genuine force of nature – a fate that Deuce had almost been saddled with. Ace could _become_ fire now, control it as he controlled his own body.

Free to wield it as he wished…

… Free to manipulate its energy in any way imaginable…

“That’s it!” Deuce cried, inspiration flashing through him to settle into an excited grin. “I’ve got it!”

Ace looked at him curiously, eyes wide. “Got what?”

“Could you manipulate your fire?” Deuce hurriedly asked, mind racing faster than he could get his words out. “Like, could you do more than just— y’know—” he gestured energetically at Ace’s flaming fist, “this?”

Thankfully, Ace seemed to understand his vague description. “I think so, maybe,” he said, although he didn’t sound entirely convinced. Deuce couldn’t really say he blamed him, given that this was a whole new ability, a new and exquisitely different way of controlling oneself. It had to _feel_ weird too, having yourself lose your physical structure to become an element – it wasn’t something that he could imagine, funnily enough. “Do you mean like…” Ace’s fist reformed as he concentrated again, index finger and thumb extended to make an L shape, “something like this?”

He pointed his finger like a gun out towards the sea and, with a little huff of exertion, fired off a tiny fireball from the tip. It arched in a brilliant parabola over the sand, disappearing into the sea some way away in the darkness. Deuce had to restrain himself from clapping excitedly like a freaking performing sealion.

“That’s it!” He encouraged, returning Ace’s smile, “like that! Do you think you could use the fire’s force? Like, it’s physical power? Could you control the output and strength of it?”

Ace screwed up his face, clearly imagining it. “You mean like… with varying degrees of power? Like controlling the difference between a tap and a punch?”

“Yeah, sure, that kind of thing!”

“I guess,” Ace said, sounding thoroughly uncertain, “I mean, I don’t know for sure, but… probably, yeah, if I had time to practice… why?”

Deuce’s cheeks actually _hurt_ with how hard he grinned – when had he last smiled this sincerely? When had he ever had happiness reciprocated and mirrored back at him such as Ace was doing now?

“I think,” Deuce’s voice shook as he spoke, “I know how we can get off this island.”

And, as Ace quite literally lit up into flames that rivalled the intensity of his beaming smile, any lingering doubt that Deuce had about his plan faded away into the night.

If anyone could do it, it was Ace.

* * *

The plan was a simple one, in Deuce’s opinion. Build a boat, fit it with an internal propeller, and use Ace’s fire to propel it. Easy. The important point to remember was that he wasn’t to use the fire in the traditional sense of burning the hapless craft, but rather using its kinetic energy to spin the propeller to make the boat move forwards. Thankfully, once Deuce had got into explaining his idea, Ace had seemed to drop the assumption that they wouldn’t be working together on it.

“So you see,” Deuce panted under the weight of the wood that Ace was stacking in his arms, knees threatening to buckle, “you’ve been failing because you’ve had to rely on the wind and rowing to get you past the current, right? That’s never gonna work; no one can row fast enough to challenge it, and the wind doesn’t come in strong enough to launch a boat clear over the sea.”

“Imagine that,” Ace said almost dreamily, piling twigs and brittle, dry leaves at the top of the sizeable amount of firewood they’d collected – kindling, Deuce recognised, hopefully meaning that Ace was now satisfied with how much they had. Quite how he had ended up as the pack mule was beyond him, given that there was no way Ace wasn’t physically stronger than he, but really, of all the misfortune to have fallen to him in the last few days, this was the absolute least of his worries.

“Yeah, imagine that indeed,” Deuce wheezed, turning with Ace when he nodded firmly and set off back to their little camp. “So if you can work your flames just right and get the boat moving without having to rely on wind or rowing, we’ll be able to break free and get the hell away from this death trap.”

“And you’re totally sure this’ll work?” Ace asked.

It took a second for Deuce to recognise that there was no bite of challenge in his question, no unspoken expectancy of failure in there. Just simple interest – just Ace, genuinely curious, wanting to know Deuce’s opinion and nothing more.

“Well, not _totally_ ,” Deuce said, the urge to defend himself, to explain and to draw on evidence rising like bile in the back of his throat on reflex – he fought it down, stamping on that learned response, and met Ace’s eyes over the stack of wood, “but yeah, it’s a solid theory, I think. It _should_ work.”

“If you think it’ll work, that’s good enough for me,” Ace said brightly, smile radiant and positively flushing with heat. “Here, lemme help you with some of that; you’ve gone all red. Sorry I didn’t notice it was too heavy for you.”

Amid spluttering that it _wasn’t_ too heavy and he _could_ cope with the rest of the short walk back down to their camp, Deuce couldn’t stop himself from smiling regardless. So this was what _praise_ felt like. It felt comforting, like eating something delicious or having a warm bath; it felt _wonderful_ , in fact, and definitely something that he’d like to try again.

The heat that rolled off Ace was another interesting side-effect of the Devil Fruit, and one that they both equally assumed to be unique to the one that he had eaten. Ace’s core body temperature had risen since he had first burst into flames, yet he didn’t feel feverish or sick at all. It came in waves, too, rising and falling with exertion and emotion, as far as they could tell. When he had burst out laughing at a rock that was unfortunately shaped like genitalia, for example, he had smothered Deuce, who had been stood beside him, in a blanket of heat. And now, clearly pleased with the vague plans for their upcoming escape, he heated the air around him once again, leaving Deuce to follow after him through its haze.

There was something distinctly calming about it; something that enveloped Deuce in a sense of blissful ease. However much he wanted to, he didn’t raise this with Ace, though – it probably wasn’t normal to find another’s body heat to be enjoyable, although he couldn’t be entirely sure.

“Also,” Deuce continued, addressing Ace’s back, “if for some reason this doesn’t work, or if we run into trouble and the boat capsizes, then—” he pulled up short, words sticking to his throat and presenting as a cough. Yet he powered through, urging himself to finish his sentence, chest puffing out unnecessarily and unseen by Ace, “then I’ll make sure you don’t drown, okay? You don’t have to worry about that.”

Ace flashed him a winning smile over his shoulder in the darkness, his features just about illuminated by the full moon overhead. “Thanks, Deuce!” He said earnestly, and Deuce found himself positively _glowing_ with pride in that name now. “It’s reassuring, knowing you’ll have my ass covered. I don’t know how I’ll ever return the favor.”

It wasn’t a favor, though, and Ace had prematurely returned it a million times over by saving Deuce already anyway. It seemed somewhat insensitive to point this out though, so Deuce let it go with a small smile back to Ace as they set down their firewood on the sand.

The camp – if it could be called a camp at all – consisted of Ace’s few belongings scattered here and there, a wind guard that had been erected parallel with the sea to head off the night time gusts that swept in over the land, and Deuce’s bag with all of his worldly belongings placed against said wind guard.

Ace’s shorts, Deuce’s coat and pants, and both of their pairs of boots had been dried off in record time thanks to Ace’s new abilities, although had necessitated the pair sitting awkwardly in their underwear for a brief spell, seeing as Ace wasn’t absolutely convinced he could dry them off without setting fire to the material. Still, it was worth it to be back in dry clothes – even if their clothes were still stiff and a little crunchy with the remaining sea salt.

“If we can collect enough water,” Ace said when he caught Deuce picking irritably at his coat after they set down their firewood, “we can wash everything and get rid of that horrible itchy feeling.”

“I’d rather wash myself if we get that much water,” Deuce muttered, running a hand through his hair, “I feel disgusting.”

Ace just snickered to himself, arranging the kindling strategically in the center of a little pile of the firewood. With a flick of his wrist he had his forefinger lit once again, flames bathing his handsome face in golden, dancing light. Lowering his hand to the wood, he bit the tip of his tongue between his teeth in concentration, looking up to Deuce for a brief moment.

“It’s harder than it looks,” Ace said, addressing Deuce’s questioning frown, “trying to ignite something else rather than just keeping myself on fire. I think it’ll get easier with practice, but for now it feels all kinds of wrong, like I’m doing something really bad.”

Now that he said it, it didn’t really come as a surprise. Keeping things from setting on fire was kind of an inbuilt response – even lighting matches back home had been a stressful task for Deuce, often resulting in him dropping them in surprise before he could light his target.

Luckily for them, though, Ace was able to set the wood alight, and within a few minutes they had a merrily crackling bonfire going. As Deuce added pieces of wood, Ace provided more and more fire to help aid it along and encourage it to keep burning under the added fuel.

Also, thankfully, Deuce didn’t have to divulge just how spectacularly he had failed at lighting his own fire for the past few nights.

“I wasn’t able to get a fire going at all,” Ace admitted once their bonfire reached a satisfactory size, freely offering the information himself, “before this one, I mean.” He sat back on the sand, palms splayed out behind his back, looking to all the world like just a regular young man out on a planned camping trip rather than finding himself stranded and in imminent danger of death on an uninhabited island. “I think it’s something to do with the quality of the wood, or the interference of the sea air maybe, but no matter what I did, I couldn’t start one. I’ve _never_ not been able to start a fire before. How about you?”

Ah. No, Deuce didn’t really want to have to reveal that not only had he failed to start any fires either, he had also never attempted to before in his life. It was a strange feeling that overcame him – an almost competitive one, despite never having had the slightest inclination towards such feelings, much to his father’s exasperation whenever exam time rolled around – where he found himself not wanting to demonstrate just how lacking his survival skills were. Ace, it seemed, knew exactly what to do out here from first-hand experience, whereas Deuce only knew from studying one too many adventure logs under the sheets late at night.

“Something to do with the wood, yeah,” Deuce echoed, shivering slightly as he warmed up. God, it felt good to be warm again! “So what did you do during the nights if you couldn’t get a fire going?”

Ace shrugged. “Same thing as you, at a guess,” he offered.

Deuce highly doubted that. Casting a furtive look at Ace’s thin, short sleeved yellow shirt and knee length shorts, he said, “I don’t think so, somehow.”

“Really?” Ace’s eyebrows shot up in surprise. “You didn’t layer palm leaves and then weave them into a blanket?” No, he hadn’t, and no, he _definitely_ hadn’t thought of doing that. Try as he might to come up with some other genius solution to dazzle Ace with, Deuce figured his poker face must have needed some serious improvement, for the next moment Ace was grinning again and looking at him with piqued curiosity. “If you didn’t do that,” he said with a touch of reverence in his voice, “then what _did_ you do? Must’ve been really effective, seeing as you’re still alive and all.”

“I, uh…”

There was no way that Deuce could tell him he’d cocooned himself in his coat and just suffered each night, fully expecting to die in his sleep. Not when Ace was looking at him all expectantly like that.

Luckily for him, though, a loud, low groan from Ace’s stomach interrupted their conversation; and then, embarrassingly, a corresponding one from Deuce’s joined in to echo its own displeasure. To their credit, it _had_ been a couple of hours since they had split the fruit, and while it had satisfied their starving stomachs, it certainly hadn’t been enough to keep them going for any length of time.

With a sheepish grin at Ace, Deuce seized his chance to steer the conversation away from outing himself as being less experienced in the art of uninhabited island survival. “Don’t suppose any more weird fruit drifted ashore with the Devil Fruit, did it?” He attempted to sound casual, yet the words rang far too hopeful for his liking.

Of course not, and he hadn’t expected any to have done so, but it was still a little saddening to see Ace shaking his head gloomily. “No,” he sighed, fixing Deuce with those eyes that still sparkled with life even in the semi-darkness, even though hunger was creeping back to terrorise them once again, “and I hadn’t found anything edible either, other than a few eggs… I tried fishing, and I _did_ catch a few, but they were all breeds that’re poisonous until cooked… and what good were those if I couldn’t get a fire started?” He flashed Deuce a despairing look. “It’s like the island is trying to kill us off, isn’t it?”

Deuce hummed in thought, agreeing completely, and yet his heart immediately felt like it was being catapulted off somewhere expectant, leaving him dizzy with glee. One thing _had_ changed for the better for them – they now had something they could use to fight back against Sixis, didn’t they?

“Do you still have those fish?” He asked, leaning in, stomach drawing him to the promise of food once more, only this time staying well clear of murder. “Did you keep them?”

A short, mournful sort of laugh issued from Ace as he slapped Deuce on the back companionably, inadvertently knocking the breath from his lungs. “Nah, they got dumped back into the sea,” he said, although he looked like he was regretting it now, “toed them off my spear with a boot – they’ll make your skin swell up and go numb if you touch them when they’re raw, see—”

“Huh,” Deuce interjected, brow furrowing, “I found some potatoes like that back in the forest yesterday. This island really is trying to tell us to fuck off.”

Ace perked up so quickly he almost gave Deuce second-hand whiplash. “Really?!” He said far too excitedly for something that they couldn’t even eat. “Where? Whereabouts did you find them? I thought I’d scoured the whole island properly – well, until I found you, anyway; how we missed each other for three days is really amazing – but I didn’t see anything suggesting that there were any—”

“Hold on,” Deuce cut in, holding his hand up to Ace’s face to quieten him, “backtrack a little. You can’t eat them; you can’t even touch them. What’s there to be excited about?”

But Ace was already getting up, scrabbling to his feet in a rush that only served to make his stomach loudly protest yet again. Bewildered, Deuce looked up at him silhouetted against the stars, brilliantly lit by the fire below in all his muscular glory.

“C’mon, let’s go find some more!” Ace grabbed for his hands, tugging at them when Deuce didn’t immediately spring to his feet with the same gusto as Ace had. With a mildly exasperated sigh Ace cocked a hip, a wry smile beaming down at Deuce’s utterly perplexed expression. “They look like a standard sweet potato, right?”

Stunned, Deuce nodded. “Yeah, just like them.”

Ace’s grin broadened, showing all of his teeth. “Now that we’ve got fire, we can make them edible. Trust me; if they’re the type I’m thinking of, then the flesh inside is edible once you bake and skin them.”

Of course he trusted Ace implicitly. Of course Deuce believed him without a shadow of a doubt once he explained himself a little better, giving Deuce the chance to understand where his mind had leapt to. How absurd to think that Ace had to _ask_ him to do such a thing.

He gently removed his gloved hands from Ace’s warm grip and got to his feet also, dusting off the sand clinging to his coat.

“I found them back this way,” he gestured over his shoulder with his thumb, adrenaline leaving him feeling fluttery and jumpy, like he could scream his joy out across the beach because _finally_ , they were going to have some actual, honest-to-goodness _food_. “Light your fist; we won’t be able to see where we’re going, otherwise.”

* * *

Ace’s obvious capabilities had Deuce thinking hard as he led the way back to where he thought he had previously found the potatoes – it was hard to know for sure exactly where they were located, given that he had been in no fit state to remember much of anything from then, and how everything looked unnervingly different in the dark. Walking side by side proved to be a little difficult due to how thick the undergrowth grew and the proximity of the trees to one another, but they managed to keep up a steady stream of chatter as they wended their way back in the direction of the poisonous potatoes… and the hateful biting ants. Deuce took a mean form of comfort in the fact that Ace could now torch the lot of them if they came at him once more with their nasty little pincers clicking.

Deuce couldn’t remember the last time he had had _fun_ simply talking with someone else. His brother had seen to it that he had had no friends back at home, repeatedly going out of his way to inform anyone who Deuce began striking up a friendship with that he was stupid, a waste of space, and the very definition of a failure. In a world where achievement was valued above anything else – in a world where things like loyalty, a decent personality, and a good sense of humor all ranked lower in importance compared to status, wealth, and test scores – Deuce hadn’t stood a fighting chance.

And yet he got the distinct impression that none of these things factored into Ace’s clear interest in him as an individual. Each question that Ace bounced at him had absolutely nothing to do with success and everything to do with what Deuce would describe as unpicking the person within. It was like… like Ace _cared_ about what made Deuce unique – and it was strikingly out of Deuce’s comfort zone.

Not in a bad way, though. No – in a way that left his cheeks heated from intimate questions such as, “what scares you badly enough to make you cry?” and, “how did you get that massive scar on your knee I saw earlier?”

See, he had never been asked anything of the sort – nothing beneath the grades and the skill (or lack of) had _mattered_ before. By the time Ace finally asked the broad question, “what makes you happy?” Deuce was feeling light and tingly from the intense yet short interrogation. Only, the curious thing was, when Ace posed what Deuce imagined to be a rather normal, bland question to anyone who had had a better family or, hell, an actual circle of friends, he almost found himself giving the most inappropriate of answers:

_You do_.

And it was true. Gone was Deuce’s irritability surrounding Ace, and gone were any traces of his desire to tell Ace to fuck off and never show his face again. Now that the effects of starvation and dehydration had receded, Deuce found that Ace was _fun_ , and he was _charming_ in an engaging, sweet sort of way.

But something told him – some little voice in the back of his mind that usually housed only anxiety and dread around social interaction – that he shouldn’t be saying something like this just yet. That it would be weird to express that the first thing that came to mind when asked about his happiness was the man whom he had disliked so thoroughly only 24 hours ago, and whom he had tried to kill.

Ah, jeez, he just couldn’t catch a break when it came to Ace, could he?

So instead Deuce deflected, hoping with all his might that Ace wouldn’t notice that he decided not to continue the conversation in the direction that he had taken. As they found the patch of earth that bore the unmistakable signs of Deuce’s earlier fevered and desperate digging, they knelt to unearth some more of those lumpy potatoes and finally get some more food in their bellies.

“Make sure you don’t touch them,” Deuce said, instinctively placing a hand over Ace’s to pre-emptively prevent him from grabbing the first one to show itself, the muddy skin just recognisable under his flaming fist, “the numbness isn’t too bad, but the swelling will really hurt.”

However, Ace made no move to pluck the potato from the ground, instead offering a soft sort of smile that had Deuce frowning confusedly at him. Ace opened his mouth as if to speak, firelight causing shadows to dance over his face, but then closed it again as if he thought better of saying something. Just what, though, Deuce couldn’t fathom.

It was lucky that he still wore his gloves. Although he had initially started to wear them as part of his bid to never reveal his identity, they had become incredibly invaluable during the freezing nights on Sixis. While their task of preventing him from leaving fingerprints everywhere wasn’t needed here, they sure as hell were helpful now as well as against the cold; Deuce was able to pull the first of the potatoes out of the ground without any problems, holding it up gleefully for Ace to see.

“And these are definitely the ones you’re thinking of?” Deuce verified nervously – he didn’t want to think of how violently their stomachs would protest if it turned out that these were an inedible variant after all. But, luckily, Ace nodded excitedly, face splitting into a dazzling grin.

“That’s them!” He said. He shrugged off his bag that he had brought along from his shoulder and held it open for Deuce to deposit the potato.

It was easy work, digging up the potatoes, and within minutes they had a sizeable collection going. Ace seemed restless about not being able to do anything though, so Deuce stripped the gloves off and handed them over to a hasty thanks and another sunny smile that tugged at his heart. After locating and lighting a large branch on fire and handing it to Deuce, Ace’s fist reformed back into skin and bone, the flames going out quite easily.

It was… well, it was _nice_ to see him so pleased, so at ease with what he was doing.

Friendship felt _good_.

“So did you try to eat these raw or something?” Ace asked as he tugged more of the earth loose and dove in, foraging with all the ease of a mole. When Deuce only gave him a quizzical look, unsure why this was important, Ace added, “if you didn’t touch them with your hands, how did you know they make your skin swell and go numb?”

“Oh,” Deuce felt silly all of a sudden, “yeah, I did try. Don’t look at me like that,” he added defensively, feeling himself heat up again when Ace raised his eyebrows, “you would’ve done the same thing on a starving stomach.”

“Oh, for sure, yeah, I would,” Ace said quickly, tone apologetic, “that’s not the problem.” His gaze slid from Deuce’s eyes to his lips, searching them, pinning them with that intense energy that never seemed to ease within Ace no matter what; it made Deuce recoil, almost, heartrate spiking most abruptly.

“W-What?” He asked, covering his mouth with the back of his free hand.

“Nothing,” Ace said with a small, sad sigh, “just thinking how much that must have hurt you. I’ve done it in the past – when Luffy and I found a bunch of these one time, I touched them and _man_ the swelling was really something… So to have that happen to your mouth…” he trailed off, the sentence not needing to be completed.

So _that_ was what he was getting at. But that little insight into Ace’s old life piqued Deuce’s interest, made him sit up a little straighter and dismiss how he had instinctively assumed that Ace was judging him. Vaguely, Deuce wondered how long it would take him to overcome that snap defensive reaction, if ever; _was_ it something that someone could recover from after a lifetime of ridicule and rebuke? He certainly hoped it was.

“Did you grow these at home?” Deuce asked, holding the flaming branch a little closer when Ace beckoned for it. “Seems like an odd thing to grow, seeing as they’re kinda dangerous.”

“No, I mean we found them when we were looking for food out in the jungle a few years ago,” Ace said _far_ too happily, entirely missing how Deuce’s mouth fell into a gape of surprise, “these things will grow anywhere, huh?”

Maybe he hadn’t heard him right. Yes, that had to be it. Deuce hadn’t just heard that Ace grew up in a jungle. There was no way. People didn’t—people didn’t _really_ do that in real life! Did they…? Had he really led such a sheltered life that the mere thought of not living in a town or a village was inconceivable to him? What did this mean about Ace’s life, about Ace’s upbringing and living situation?

Question after question buzzed around Deuce’s mind like angry bees, each one louder than the previous. Yet one thought stood prominent among the burst of confusion – one emotion. He couldn’t quite label it; it wasn’t _pity,_ exactly, no… but it was along that kind of vein. Not so much for the potential lack of village life, however surprising that was. It was more like…

“So when you were a kid?” Deuce asked, the question coming far softer and gentler than he had intended. When Ace nodded and didn’t seem at all unsettled by this revelation, Deuce continued, “but… why were two kids digging for food in a jungle? Was it part of a game or something?” But he knew this wasn’t the case, somehow, before he had even finished his sentence, and the look that Ace gave him told him all he needed to know. “And you didn’t know about their poisonous skin when you found them?”

“No,” Ace said, dumping more of them into the bag before dragging a forearm over his brow, “but we learned pretty quickly,” he added with a wry grin.

Learning quickly or not wasn’t the problem here – not at all. “But you could have died if you weren’t careful,” Deuce breathed, shocked, “if you didn’t know what they were, what you were touching, then it could have been fatal. There’re _loads_ of plants out there that look innocent but are deadly.” His heart ached for the thought of the two boys covered in dirt, rooting around in the ground for reasons that his middle-class ass couldn’t begin to relate to. This pang of pain was not lessened by Ace nodding his casual agreement.

“Yeah,” Ace said dismissively, and the band that seemed to have formed around Deuce’s heart _squeezed_ most unpleasantly at how apathetic he sounded, like this wasn’t something that was worthy of getting worked up over, “but I _was_ careful, wasn’t I? I had Luffy to protect, so it’s not like I was reckless.” Deuce couldn’t help but privately disagree with this statement – it sounded very much like allowing two kids to be out in the jungle unsupervised was well within the definition of _reckless_ – “I only got mildly poisoned a few times in total, but I knew how to look after myself. Luffy, on the other hand—” He stopped suddenly, and when Deuce raised his eyes from the little pit they had dug back up to Ace’s face, he was struck by how tenderly Ace was looking at him. “You’re a lot nicer when you’re not starving,” Ace smiled broadly, “did you know that?”

Deuce choked and spluttered, his throat seeming to have closed up without warning. _Nice? Him?_ No one had ever called him _nice_ before. _Was_ he nice? Were his words, his concern, things of value here to Ace?

“I’m not _trying_ to be,” Deuce said quickly, dropping his gaze down to Ace’s bag, which was now filthy with dirt from the potatoes, “that’s not what I was trying to do.”

“Mhm,” Ace hummed, brushing his hands together to knock off any excess dirt from the gloves, “I know. I can tell.” When Deuce chanced looking back up, Ace’s eyes still glittered in the torchlight right back at him. Silently, gaze trained to Deuce’s as if to look away would be to break some sort of spell, perhaps, Ace removed the gloves and handed them back to him. “Here,” he said, “I think that’ll be enough for now.” Deuce wordlessly took back the gloves, desperately wanting to say more, to ask all of his millions of ill-defined questions that were burning for answers, yet finding that he couldn’t give a single one of them a voice. So Ace shone a small smile and said, “I think we’ve collected enough of these to last us tonight and tomorrow, if we don’t go overboard. Shall we head back?”

Nodding in agreement, Deuce silently dipped the burning branch into the pit, which Ace smothered in dirt kicked in on standing. He lit his fist once again and hauled his bag over his shoulder effortlessly, entirely missing how Deuce opened his mouth to protest that he could carry it.

On slipping the gloves back on, Deuce was stunned by how hot they were on the inside.

* * *

He wanted to bring it up as they waited for the potatoes to bake in the bonfire – even if he didn’t exactly know what _it_ was.

Whatever _it_ pertained to, it made Deuce quiet and thoughtful, often missing the end of Ace’s questions and sentences that varied from wondering how many stars there were in the sky to informing Deuce about the seagull nests that he hadn’t tried raiding yet.

This was a curious sensation for him, this whole _caring_ thing.

Deuce had never actively _cared_ for someone else before. Sure, he had definitely cared about what others _thought_ of _him_ , but that feeling of wanting another to be safe and happy was unusual and new. Something he recognised for what it was, yet like it was slightly off balance and out of place – something akin to being in a room full of people one had briefly met two or three times. Their faces were familiar, but that natural and comforting level of recognition hadn’t formed yet.

So to feel this feeling – this involuntary compassion that kicked in like a reflex – was a little jarring for him, and yet the image of two children alone in the jungle would not leave him in peace.

“Are you okay?” Ace eventually asked when Deuce simply grunted in response for the fourth time in a row, his mind plainly on other things. “Sorry, am I boring you? We can talk about something else if you want to?”

Ah, no, that wasn’t the problem at all. Ace’s chosen topic was fine – contemplating how many potatoes it would take to fill their hungry stomachs – and, in yet another confusing way, it was strangely relaxing. And, now that he had been given the opportunity to address the unsettling sadness that gripped him on behalf of Ace’s past, Deuce found that he couldn’t bring himself to say anything.

He couldn’t tell if it was cowardice or compassion that stilled his tongue.

Instead, he smiled reassuringly at Ace and said, “no, you’re fine. Sorry, my mind’s on the food, that’s all.”

Which wasn’t a lie – and to prove this point, Deuce’s stomach growled angrily at the mere mention of the delectable F word.

The wait for the potatoes to bake in the flames didn’t take as long as Deuce had expected – or perhaps it was just that talking to Ace was so much _fun_ that the passage of time no longer felt like something to endure, but rather something to enjoy. Even covering the simple topics such as comparing how they had gathered water (notably both settling for the cliff faces, Deuce was rather proud to discover) was engaging and enlightening. Ace’s survival knowledge shone through once again when he mentioned that now that they had a means of boiling water, they could begin to dig for spring water rather than relying on the faces of the cliffs. Deuce hadn’t even considered this as a possibility, something which he tried with all his might to cover up… yet he was quite certain that Ace saw through his act, if his smile was anything to go by.

But what really interested Deuce – what caught his attention more completely than any other topic they had meandered into all day – was how Ace brought up the topic of fishing again, suggesting that they give it a go the next morning.

_Fish_. _Protein_. Deuce caught himself almost salivating at the thought of baked fish, mind helpfully conjuring up the memory of the smell of it drifting through the family house from the kitchen. He had never cooked it himself, but it couldn’t be that hard, could it? And Ace had to know how to, assuming that his knowledge of the outdoors extended to living things as well as poisonous potatoes.

With that thought, Deuce looked up from where he had been tracing patterns into the dry sand, absent-mindedly drawing a bonfire in the light of the merrily burning real one. Without really paying attention, he hadn’t noticed how Ace’s chatter had died down and been replaced by skinning their meal with the knife at his hip, the skins curling into a little pile beside him.

“Don’t you need the gloves for that?” Deuce asked hurriedly, crawling over to Ace and peering at his handiwork.

Ace just shook his head, focused on his task. “The fire stops the poison,” he pointed out, pausing to run a finger down the skin that hadn’t been shed yet, “fuck me if I can explain the process, but—” he stopped abruptly as Deuce snorted at the curse, covering his mouth with his hand. “What?” Ace smiled uncertainly, searching Deuce’s face. “You’re not comfortable with swearing?”

“No, that’s not it,” Deuce said, unable to keep the laugh out of his voice, “I did it plenty myself yesterday—it’s that expression. It’s funny.”

“What, _‘fuck me’_?” Ace asked, clearly amused. When Deuce nodded with another snort, Ace turned back to his potatoes, smirking. “Don’t they say it where you’re from? It’s a standard expression of frustration back home.”

The people in his life back at home hadn’t exactly been the types to curse – cursing was for the _lesser_ people, as far as Deuce’s family had been concerned. Cursing was crude, and vulgar, and demonstrated a limited vocabulary, his father had said… which had done nothing but drive Deuce to deciding that the moment he was free, he would incorporate such language into his thoughts and speech as much as he deemed fit. Fucking served them right.

“Anyway,” Deuce said, nodding at the potato that Ace had just set down with the rest, “aren’t those hot, straight out the fire? How can you touch them?”

Ace shrugged, yet he looked quite pleased. As he divided the freshly skinned pile up between them onto the palm leaf he’d cut in half to act as plates, he explained, “I touched one to see if the Devil Fruit made any difference to how I react to temperature, and it turns out I can hold them no problem. They feel hot, but not _hot_ hot, y’know? Weird, isn’t it? But kinda neat at the same time.”

“Yeah,” Deuce said vaguely, suddenly a whole lot less interested in Ace’s newfound tolerance for heat; one of the palm leaf plates was passed to him with a big, beaming smile from Ace, and now literally nothing else in the world mattered save for getting that food into his stomach.

But—

Right as Deuce reached to grab one and tear into it in all its piping hot glory, he pulled up short, heart racing.

He couldn’t eat it. Trembling as his hands might be, and as loudly as his stomach wailed for the soft orange potatoes puffing out little clouds of steam, Deuce couldn’t bring himself to start eating. At least not yet.

On looking to Ace, he recognised his problem quite easily, for there lay a reaction of the likes he hadn’t consciously considered yet – it felt _wrong_ to take a bite if Ace wasn’t doing so as well. Like going against one’s instinct or gut feeling, he guessed it to be similar to, like he was considering doing something that was wrong on every level imaginable.

And Ace noticed – for what _didn’t_ Ace notice? It was something about him that Deuce was fast learning – that ability to recognise and understand the unspoken, the language woven into the body and heart of another… the language that Deuce himself could barely speak, never mind identify as accurately as Ace.

“Go on,” Ace encouraged, sitting down next to Deuce so close that their knees touched, “you don’t have to hold back.” He patted the knee in contact with his own, causing Deuce to unwillingly flinch.

“I’m not,” Deuce gasped, his throat seeming to constrict without warning, most annoyingly, “I mean, I won’t, I just…” He trailed off, looking from Ace’s freckles to his palm leaf cradled in his lap as he inched his knee away and out of contact with Ace’s. It bothered him how he couldn’t say it, couldn’t just come out with the words _your wellbeing is of far greater importance than my own_ , but then again how could he expect himself to be so open about such a feeling? How could he give it voice when he didn’t fully understand it himself? The threat of starvation was gone; the shame of trying to kill and steal wasn’t present in this situation, although was still _there_ at the back of his mind, of course…

Ace, however, misinterpreted Deuce’s lack of sufficient explanation. “Right, I didn’t consider that angle,” he said thoughtfully, frowning at the food. “Even if they’re safe to touch now, we might not be able to eat them. I mean, they _look_ the same as the ones Luffy and I had, but _are_ they? They might make our stomachs explode or something.”

Despite suggesting something so dramatic and morbid, Ace didn’t seem at all perturbed by such a possibility – one which Deuce hadn’t contemplated either, for that matter.

Deuce looked at his lap sorrowfully, shoulders slumping and stomach moaning that it didn’t care if it ran the risk of a violent death so long as it was filled first. “So what do we do?” He asked sadly. “How do we test this?”

Ace hummed in thought, tapping a finger to his chin. “Only one way to go about it,” he said with finality, nodding. “I’ll test one, and if it does anything weird to me then I’ll… I dunno… burn it from the inside out.” He screwed up his face in plain doubt, frown deepening. “That should be possible, right? Setting my insides on fire?”

It sounded farfetched and suicidal outside of the context of the Devil Fruit, and would have normally seen Deuce wondering if Ace was feeling all right. But he nodded, thinking hard. “You _can_ turn into fire,” he said slowly, studying Ace’s expression and seeing the resolution building silently, “so it’s not impossible… I think… Also,” he gave a sarcastic little sigh, raising an eyebrow at Ace, “things have been going too well this evening, haven’t they? There’s no way that Sixis is kind enough to let us get away with _more_ good luck.”

“You’re right,” Ace snickered, “wonder how much longer this good fortune will last? Only one way to find out.”

“Yeah,” Deuce agreed, swallowing nervously, “only one way, I guess.”

Their stomachs rumbled loudly in sync, begging them to just get on with it and put them out of their misery one way or the other already, making both Deuce and Ace giggle anxiously, nerves obvious.

“It’ll be okay,” Ace said in a tone of blatant self-reassurance, picking up a piece of potato and examining it closely, “we’re overthinking this, aren’t we?”

“Yeah, definitely.” _We’re probably not thinking it through_ enough _, but there you go._

With mounting trepidation and a sense that no, things _couldn’t_ possibly go their way for this long on the island of Sixis, Deuce swallowed nervously as Ace raised the potato to his mouth.

“Well,” Ace said with flat resignation, looking more like a man walking into the depths of battle than preparing to take a bite of his dinner, “here goes.”

He squeezed his eyes shut as he bit down and chewed ferociously, leaving Deuce to watch nervously. Anticipation hung in the air, charged like static between them while Deuce held his breath, frantically running through all the plants he knew of that could combat poisoning in the event that Ace’s fire didn’t work. Not that he had seen any such plants on his travels around Sixis – although, no, he hadn’t been _looking_ —

Sweat beaded at his brow and slid down his back as he watched Ace swallow – he could very well be about to lose him, couldn’t he? Oh, what had he been _thinking?_ How could he have let Ace do this? Why had he let his desire to see Ace eat first win over caution? The food in question posed the risk of still being _lethal_ , however unlikely! _He_ should have done it, should have snatched one of his own and tested whether it still held the power to kill someone outright!

“H-How is it?” Deuce asked tentatively, anxiously watching the bob of Ace’s throat, how his lips glistened with saliva in the dancing bonfire flames as he licked them. “How do you feel?”

Ace’s eyes flew open, a grin of triumph spreading whole and confident in the face of Deuce’s palpable anxiety.

“It’s delicious!” Ace exclaimed, taking another huge bite. “It worked, Deuce! We did it! It’s safe!”

He could hardly believe it – Ace threw his hands up into the air with a whoop of laughter, the potato in his fist sailing through the night in a blur of orange.

“W-We have food!” Deuce cheered, encouraged by Ace’s vigorous nodding. “We have _food!”_

With a flurry of sand and devoid of intention they moved as one, grabbing at each other and squeezing into a hard, firm hug driven by sheer blissful relief. They now had a food source – a sustainable one too, theoretically – and it wasn’t going to try to kill them.

And, most importantly, Ace wasn’t in danger.

Warmth poured off Ace as he giggled in Deuce’s ear, his bare chest heating Deuce’s instantly—but it couldn’t even begin to compare with how hot Deuce’s heart felt, how happiness and relief threatened tears of overwhelming volume to spill and soak Ace’s shoulder. He couldn’t remember the last time he had hugged someone, either, he realised. The cold loneliness within him – the one that had receded a little just in the few hours he had _known_ Ace – seemed to shrivel that little bit more, powerless to the inferno tearing through Deuce’s veins and seizing his heart.

And so, as he felt Ace begin to pull away, Deuce allowed that feeling to guide him into keeping Ace held against him. He didn’t want to let go – not just yet – however unfamiliar it felt to be in the embrace of another, and however awkward he immediately felt upon coming to his senses and catching up with what they had done.

Ace, as ever, seemed to understand what couldn’t be coherently conveyed through mere words, what a lifetime of struggling against the urge for closeness and contact only to have it scolded and stamped down did to the man who held him. Tightening his grip around Deuce’s neck, Deuce felt him deflate into a content sigh, all the tension draining from him in one long, gradual motion as he sank into the hug.

“Thank you,” Deuce mumbled, tucking his face down into the crook of Ace’s neck, “thank you so much, Ace.”

He had to admit that he was a little surprised that Ace didn’t say anything back – no questions as to what Deuce was referring to, no insistences that Deuce had nothing to thank him for… just quiet acceptance in the form of Ace squeezing him a little harder, huffing a small, grateful sound.

When they eventually released each other and hastily rounded on their food, it turned out that it was without a doubt the best meal that Deuce had ever had—well, second only to the Devil Fruit in terms of how _grateful_ he had been for that.

Although bland by regular meal standards, the potatoes were sweet and delicious, filling them up to bursting point and leaving them laughing raucously at the most ridiculous of stories about Ace’s brother. Deuce couldn’t even find it in himself to care that he had nothing to contribute to the conversation, enjoying Ace’s tales of hair-raising adventures and foolish ideas that they had concocted and followed through on in their youth. What’s more, Ace seemed to _shine_ when he smiled like that, now completely losing any vestiges of the morose sadness that had clouded his face earlier on – and Deuce wondered if perhaps he, too, had at last recovered from the gaunt, defeated look about him that he had definitely sported.

He sure hoped so.

Their feast was concluded with water from one of Ace’s backup bottle that he pulled from his bag, throwing himself to the floor and shuffling along the sand like a particularly lethargic snake in his attempt to reach it rather than bothering with standing up. He thrust the bottle into Deuce’s hands, grinning when Deuce spluttered his thanks, and watched with his chin in his palm as Deuce drank deeply after reassuring him that he needn’t worry about draining his supplies.

“You never stop to appreciate just how fuckin’ _good_ water is until you have to go without it,” Ace said, sounding pleased. “Isn’t that the best damn drink you’ve ever had in your life?”

Too right it was; Deuce illustrated his agreement by planting an exaggerated kiss on the bottle, earning a loud snort of laughter from Ace. Right now, he felt that he could proclaim his undying love to the water, to the potatoes, and damn, even life itself.

Instead he yawned widely, stretching out in front of himself and lacing his fingers together to form a bridge.

“It’s been one hell of a day, hasn’t it?” Deuce said thickly through his yawn, catching Ace nodding out of the corner of his eye.

“You can say that again,” Ace agreed with a look of mild appreciation at how much they had gone through in just a few short hours, “never thought I’d see the day where finding myself on fire would turn out to be _useful_.” He laughed lightly, shaking his head in amusement. “For a while back there, I started thinking I really was going to die on this island, but all that’s changed now, hasn’t it?”

Deuce nodded, thinking hard. If they were going to be honest and frank – and god knew he was relaxed enough to be exactly that – now was as good a time as any to say what had been on his mind, however embarrassed he was by it.

“This will probably sound really ignorant – and I suppose it is, actually – but I had no idea that surviving could be this hard.” He lowered his gaze away from the bonfire down to his hands (and away from Ace’s suddenly intense stare), fiddling with his blunt nails, the gloves still in his pocket. “I’ve never gone hungry like this before,” he admitted like it was something disgusting, something to be ashamed of, “nor thirsty. I’ve never been in a situation where physically dying was a very real possibility. I never really considered what it would feel like to…” he glanced at Ace, who nodded encouragingly, “to find myself _that_ desperate to keep living.”

Ace seemed to know exactly what he was getting at, nodding thoughtfully long after Deuce had fallen silent again. He took a sip from his bottle when Deuce handed it to him, grunting his thanks, before saying, “that’s normal, isn’t it? It’s normal for someone to never know of such dramatic hardships. I think, in a way, it’s good that you couldn’t imagine what it would be like.” He paused, draining the last of the bottle before setting it down beside him.

“Not really,” Deuce grimaced, “I underestimated the sea, what it really means to be a sailor. I’d thought I’d accounted for the worst possible case scenario, and look how well that turned out…”

“Well, no,” Ace conceded, tilting his head to the side – the motion gave the impression that Ace was chasing a thought around in there, which was most amusing, “I guess that’s true, but we sure turned that on its head, didn’t we?”

The warmth exuding from Ace – both from his wide, confident smile and also the palpable rise in the temperature of the air around him – washed over Deuce like a calming balm. It soothed, that heat did, made his mind pleasantly foggier with the urge for sleep, helped along significantly by his full, satisfied stomach.

“Yeah,” Deuce agreed comfortably, drawing his knees to his chest and hugging them in close, settling his cheek to them, “we did.”

Or, rather, _Ace_ had. Deuce, as far as he was concerned, hadn’t fucking done anything of merit other than fish Ace out of the sea, and even that could barely classify itself as _turning the situation on its head_ , in his opinion. It seemed in poor taste to point this out, though, especially considering how Ace refused to stop smiling at him like _that_.

“You’re so clever,” Deuce blurted out unprompted, once again swinging the conversation in a direction it hadn’t been naturally heading to, “you know all sorts of things about surviving out here and how to apply that knowledge. It’s admirable.”

Soft, melodic laughter colored the night air as Ace’s grin grew even wider – yet when his eyes flickered back open to look at Deuce, that warmth of his didn’t quite seem to reach them, curiously. Immediately, Deuce felt the need to backtrack, to take back what he had said, even if he had no idea how _that_ could have been hurtful or insensitive… but Ace found his voice before Deuce could.

“Dunno about clever and admirable,” Ace snickered, an unsettling bite of cold tinging the edges of his voice, “but yeah, I’ll take that. I never went to school,” he answered Deuce’s unspoken question, his curiosity evidently obvious on his face despite how he tried to look neutral, “so I wouldn’t describe myself as _clever_ , exactly—”

“You can be intelligent without being book-smart!” Deuce interrupted at once, pushing aside the shock of this further glimpse into Ace’s childhood with difficulty. “There’s—but—school isn’t the only way to measure someone’s mind!”

Oh, how his father would scorn him if he could hear him spouting that line – and how narrow-minded his father had been to refute such a claim, no matter how many times it had been proven, insisting that academic failure in his youngest son meant that son was unworthy of kindness, of notice.

“No one that I know back home could have survived here as long as you have – _I_ couldn’t have survived here for a week like you!” Deuce frowned hard at Ace’s look of surprise, felt his cheeks heating up yet a-fucking- _gain_ because _why_ did Ace have to keep sporting such an honest, open air about him— “Don’t sell yourself short,” he grunted, definitely not pouting a little, “I could give you any number of examples of people I went to school with who could recite back a textbook, but couldn’t fathom how to think outside the box like you do.”

There was something distinctly _soft_ in Ace’s expression when he hummed and asked the oddly benign question, “does everyone think like that where you come from?”

Deuce snorted rather harder than he had intended to, hurting the back of his throat in the process.

“Absolutely not,” came his scathing answer, finding the contempt impossible to keep out of his tone, “everyone I knew only cared about grades and academic performance. Not one of them had a thought of their own at any point in their lives, I’m sure.” He sighed loud enough to almost miss Ace’s little hum of understanding (although _what_ he now understood was quite beyond Deuce’s scope of imagination), willing himself to settle down, to not let his anger boil over and bother Ace, who this definitely did not affect, nor who needed to be burdened by such problems. “Anyway,” he gave Ace a little nod, coat sleeve scratchy against his cheek, “my point is that you’re brilliant, okay? And certainly far better suited to this life than I am.”

The smile vanished from Ace’s face so quickly and so completely that Deuce sat upright again, alert, the sleepiness banished at once in the face of having messed up. Had he said something wrong? _Had_ he run his big stupid mouth too much and said something insensitive without realising it? Their backgrounds were so different, after all, that it wasn’t outside the realms of possible for him to have said something that Ace could consider crude.

Or…

_Or…_

Oh, fuck, he’d just called Ace brilliant and admirable _to his face_.

Upon realising what he had said, Deuce felt his chest tighten and stomach clench, suddenly and acutely breathless. People didn’t _say that_ about each other. They didn’t! Those were such raw statements, thoughts meant only for yourself, weren’t they?

“Sorry,” he said in a rush, heart in his throat, “I shouldn’t have said that—I take it back—well, no, I can’t, because you are, but I shouldn’t have said it—”

“Huh?” Ace looked at him blankly—

—and Deuce panicked just a little bit more on the inside.

“I was a bit too heavy-handed with my praise,” he felt hot all over, and not because of the warmth from both Ace and the bonfire, “sorry, it was too much, wasn’t it?”

“Was it?” Ace looked vaguely confused, frowning slightly, as if the words had had no effect on him whatsoever, before shrugging and replacing it with a smile. “I was just thinking how that’s not true at all.”

He almost didn’t want to ask. “What’s not true?”

“That I’m better suited to this sort of life than you are.”

Oh.

Deuce felt himself relax with enough speed to rival a balloon being popped, the thrumming of his heart against his ribs lessening and dying back down to something resembling normal. He _hadn’t_ fucked up, thank _goodness_ —and now he had made himself look foolish for absolutely no reason.

Fantastic.

Nevertheless, Deuce was determined to not let this minor setback affect him (outside of flushing scarlet all the way down to his _chest_ , most humiliatingly), and so he grabbed up the stick they had used to prod and roll the potatoes in the heart of the fire, giving the bonfire a healthy stab.

“I wasn’t looking for sympathy, by the way,” Deuce explained, avoiding Ace’s keen gaze as Ace very deliberately leant forwards, trying to make eye contact, “I was just stating the fact that you’re better suited to all this survival shit than me, some pampered rich boy.”

Something told him that this statement surprised Ace; Deuce felt the atmosphere between them shift ever so slightly – the kind of sensation one might experience when being watched, yet the stalker hadn’t been sighted yet, for example – although when he looked round to Ace to see what had changed, he found Ace just looking at him with rapt fascination, excitement positively pouring off him. It didn’t quite match the chill that had prickled along the backs of his arms at his derogatory jab at his old life, yet…

“That’s not true!” Ace said, and it rather sounded like he was _scolding_ Deuce for pointing out the damned obvious. “I wouldn’t have thought of using my fire to power a boat. That’s some impressive shit, that there. No, really, it is!” He gave Deuce’s knee a shove when he made a disbelieving sound at the back of his throat. “You told me not to sell myself short, but here you are doing exactly that to yourself! Don’t _do_ that,” he urged, snorting at Deuce’s incredulous expression, “that was some really creative thinking, a proper example of _thinking outside the box._ ” He grinned, bright and stunning, when Deuce didn’t have a comeback for having his own words used in his support. “Look, if you think about it, we’re effectively filling in each other’s blanks, that’s all. If we both knew the same things, we’d both be doomed to die here.”

That made sense, much to Deuce’s surprise. He hadn’t thought of it that way, and Ace’s smug grin told him that Ace, too, had known as much.

“Then I guess,” Deuce said slowly, turning his attention back to the bonfire, lifting a thick branch with the point of his stick to lay it back into the middle of the flames, “you could say we complete each other, in a sense.” It almost made him cringe, saying that, made him think of how it better belonged in the pages of his notebook and kept well away from the ears of others.

However, Ace nodded enthusiastically, and Deuce could barely find it in himself to be amazed anymore by Ace’s polar opposite response in comparison to his.

“Yeah,” Ace mused thoughtfully, “kinda fits us well, though, don’t you think? Y’know,” he gestured between them energetically, reminding Deuce somewhat of an excitable puppy proud to show off his victorious catch, somehow, “Ace and Deuce. One and two.” Knocking the sand off his palms with a brisk clap, Ace then jammed his fingers together to interlock into a tight ladder, brandishing them at Deuce’s bewildered face. “Two pieces to complete the puzzle. Two halves to make a whole, like this, see?”

He saw. He understood – perhaps better than Ace did, even. Oh, god, the _implications_ ; and Ace appeared to be blissfully unaware of them, far too preoccupied with grinning back at Deuce. Hell, if lines and observations like those came that easily to him, then maybe Ace would naturally make a better writer than he did?

“So you _did_ know how our names match,” Deuce huffed, amused, desperately scrabbling for something to say that didn’t point in the direction of calling Ace out on not seeing the significance in something else that he’d come up with.

Those gray eyes were lost as Ace’s whole face split into a huge grin, freckles positively glowing in the dancing flames. “It took a while, but I remembered, yeah.”

It was with sheepish grins that they lay down side by side to sleep some thirty minutes later, bonfire at their feet keeping them comfortably warm and invoking a sense of security of the likes that Deuce had not felt once since arriving on Sixis – or ever, really. Or perhaps it wasn’t the gentle rolling waves of heat that brought about this serenity, but was in fact due to Ace himself? Either way, it helped draw in the lull of sleep, Deuce noted comfortably, stifling another yawn against the back of his hand. Ace, interestingly, mirrored his action, hiding his own gigantic yawn in his palm.

“I can’t remember the last time I slept this close to someone else,” Deuce confessed, pillowing his head on his arm just like Ace did. “I think the last time might have been when I was about five, when my brother and I tried out making a pillow fort in his room.” But despite how Ace was clearly interested in this little insight into Deuce’s relationship with his older brother (if that twitch in his eyebrows was any sort of indicator), Deuce didn’t elaborate. Remembering that occasion brought about a stabbing pain somewhere deep in him; somewhere that couldn’t bear to link that fun occasion with the man that his brother had grown up to be. So he redirected, saying what else was on his mind, regardless of how ridiculous it sounded in his head. “It feels weird, thinking how you’re gonna see me sleeping.”

Ace smiled at him – a smile that gave away how Ace understood the unspoken note of vulnerability that quavered in Deuce’s voice.

“Why? Do you pull strange faces in your sleep or something?” Ace teased, looking most pleased when Deuce frowned at him.

“I hope you don’t snore,” Deuce countered somewhat coolly, “otherwise you’re gonna get a boot to a shin.”

Ace’s eyes lidded with his broad grin, warming Deuce’s heart far more effectively than the bonfire could ever achieve. “Same back to you!” He snickered. “If you start snoring then you’re getting rolled, and I don’t mean gently.”

“It’s a good thing I don’t snore then, isn’t it?” Deuce said loftily, attention momentarily caught by how the light sea breeze continued to lift and catch Ace’s thick hair and tickle his freckles.

“That you know of.” Ace looked far too pleased with himself in the face of Deuce’s sarcastic, indignant gasp.

He wanted to laugh _so_ badly, the urge bubbling up through his full stomach and shivering along his spine into a powerful tensing of his abdomen, his shoulders. Biting his lip to stop himself from making any highly embarrassing sounds, Deuce simply beamed back at Ace by way of reply.

Tonight, all that filled Deuce’s thoughts was Ace. All that filled his vision, too, was Ace. Ace laying on his side, pose that of Deuce’s, looking right back at him; looking him over in that appraising manner that one might adopt when studying a specimen of intense academic interest, maybe – probably not unlike the first time Deuce had handled and dissected a heart in a biology class, even. That had been indescribable at the time – there had been something at the depths of his soul that had called out that this was intimate and personal, directly touching a heart. There had been poetry waiting to be written; prose etched to ventricles and chamber walls that Deuce had transcribed in the back of his class notebook in a messy, illegible shorthand that had made little sense once the lesson had concluded.

And Ace was gazing at Deuce like he was every bit as captivating as that heart had been to Deuce.

It made him squirm, nerves prickling along with his quickened, interested pulse… and he wondered if this was perhaps another thing that Ace was unconsciously reflecting back to Deuce—

—and Deuce wondered if _he_ was all that filled Ace’s world just as Ace was doing for him right now.

… Probably not, given that Deuce was definitely not the first person that Ace had ever felt he could trust without reserve… but it was still nice to lose himself in that possibility.

Rolling onto his back and tearing his gaze from that deep, soulful storm, Deuce sighed and folded his arms under his head. “We’ve got a lot to do tomorrow,” he said, noting how Ace also shifted onto his back beside him, attention turned towards the vast sky. “Are you nervous about it?”

Ace snorted, earning a questioning look from Deuce. “Nope,” he said confidently, grinning up at the endless sky, “I can’t wait to get us off this island! I’ll get the hang of it soon enough, you’ll see.”

“I don’t doubt you will,” Deuce said quietly, more to himself than consciously hoping Ace would acknowledge his faith in him. “I have full confidence that you’ll manage.”

It took a moment for it to sink in that Ace didn’t respond, but when the silence was finally noticed amid Deuce’s racing thoughts, he turned his head to check whether Ace had perhaps fallen asleep, hence the quiet.

He had not.

Ace was looking at him again, lips parted like he wanted to say something but not knowing quite what. When Deuce didn’t say anything to help him out or prompt, he himself left momentarily speechless, Ace eventually asked, “why?”

Oh. Was that it? Deuce had been expecting something far more interesting than that.

“Because I trust you,” he said, amazed that he even had to say it. Wasn’t it obvious? “Your power will get us off this island because you’ll be able to control it perfectly… with a little training, of course.”

“And – correct me if I’m wrong here – but you don’t really tend to trust people much, do you?” Ace asked slowly, blinking wide-eyed at him.

“Can you blame me for that?” Deuce frowned, looking back up to the sky with a huff. “I’ve never met someone who would behave as selflessly as you have today. If it had been anyone else who offered me that fruit, then I can promise you there would have been an ulterior motive behind it. The people I left behind weren’t kind and never thought of others. You’re a good person, therefore I trust you.”

He had been rather blunter than he would have liked to be, had he really been given the chance to think about and rehearse what he wanted to say, but instead that damned old habit of opening his mouth and letting his stupid stream of consciousness pour out had won over self-restraint. So, as he internally repeated his little speech back to himself, cheeks reddening with how _frank_ he had been, Deuce cleared his throat loudly.

“That is to say you’re nice, I mean,” he babbled quickly, glancing at Ace and wishing he would stop _staring_ at him like that, “trustworthy. A better man than me by a long shot, that’s for sure—”

“Do you really think so?”

It was a challenge, definitely, and one laced with a coldness that didn’t suit Ace in the slightest. _He_ didn’t think so – that much was obvious – but what wasn’t immediately obvious was _why_ … until Deuce remembered the hate with which Ace had spoke of his father, Roger, the day before. The only thing that seemed to successfully dampen that vivacious energy of Ace’s was bringing up Roger or, by extension, his family, and Deuce had unwittingly walked right into inadvertently hurting him.

God, fuck it. He still had _so much_ to learn.

“Yes,” Deuce said firmly, a strange sense of anger welling up in him at that withdrawn look that clouded Ace’s handsome face. “ _Yes._ Listen—” how much was safe to say without further souring what had just been a fun conversation? “—a bad man does not save another’s life as you did. A bad man would not share his food as you did.” He took a deep breath, willing himself to calm down, to not overthink now that he was aware of how open he was being. “You’re good, and believe me when I say I know evil people when I see them. People who disguise themselves as upstanding members of society, but who secretly have the most appalling of moral compasses. You’ve shown me that being a pirate doesn’t automatically make someone bad; they showed me that being esteemed members of their community doesn’t mean they’re necessarily decent people.”

A sad, unconvinced smile broke under Ace’s freckles, and it did little to calm Deuce’s nerves. “Sounds like you’ve learned a lot since coming to Sixis,” he said with what sounded like an attempt to lighten the mood he had set.

“I have.” When it came to Ace, he just couldn’t lie, could he? Couldn’t hide what he thought, what he meant. It should have been concerning.

“Y’know,” Ace sighed, looking at Deuce like he was someone to be _pitied_ , most unnervingly, “you sorta remind me of someone I used to know. Less angry and more sad than him, though. Very sad inside. And you’re far kinder than you seem to think you are.”

Him? _Him?_ Ace wanted to talk about how _he_ was kind? Why was he bringing that up again? Firstly, it was nonsense, and secondly, it wasn’t important right now even if it _was_ true – no matter how that praise made him positively swell with happiness, this wasn’t the moment for it. He couldn’t help but wonder if Ace knew this and was deflecting on purpose, artificially driving the topic away from the possibility of hearing any more words (lies? Did he see them as lies?) of gratitude and appreciation.

And all that was quite overlooking the pain that seemed to flash in Ace’s eyes at the mention of that person that he had once known.

“Ace,” Deuce tried, “that’s really not—”

“Anyway,” Ace interrupted gently, smiling at Deuce with brilliance of the kind that could banish even the most sorrowful of thoughts, “sorry for turning the conversation in a difficult direction. It’s nice of you to feel safe around me.”

There it was again. Nice of _him_. For feeling a certain way. Never mind how Ace had quite literally saved his life – no. To Ace, _this_ was what warranted thanks. There was something unsettling about that, something that saw Deuce wanting to argue his case, to pull evidence and map it out in the sand and _prove_ beyond doubt that Ace was good, was wonderful, was worthy of every favorable word available to him in his vocabulary.

But instead he could only watch in silence as Ace yawned widely and turned back to face the stars, rubbing the heel of his palm to his eyes.

“Sleep well, Deuce.”

Deuce copied him, looking away after one last lingering exploration of what he could see of Ace’s face.

“You too, Ace.”

And the emptiness he had once seen up there in the silence, in the night – that eternal expanse of nothing, a perfect reflection of what resided within himself, mirrored straight back at him – suddenly seemed too crowded. It wasn’t empty in the slightest, was it? Had never been. Every star in the sky was a sun, bright and glorious, each one of them filling what Deuce had misinterpreted as an endless void that little bit further with their heat and power.

The universe reflecting back at him was brimming full of light and warmth.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> ... so yes! Enjoy! Comments and kudos let writers know that their time and effort wasn't wasted screaming into a void! TTTT I hope you look forward to the next chapter, which will be a lot lighter and sillier now that we've got Deuce's internal voice thoroughly sorted out.
> 
> See you soon!


	4. Sixis: Part III

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Just in time to be superseded by the manga that starts in two days' time lmao. Come on Boichi, keep it gay ♥
> 
> And that's it for Sixis! They're off and away! This chapter is much sillier than the previous two, and I actually like it!
> 
> I'm so sorry for the enormous wait!! I'm going to see what direction the manga takes before I carry on with this fic, I think. My plan is to spend next chapter dicking around in the first town Ace and Deuce land in, establishing some things that didn't get looked at on Sixis etc. The chapter after introduces Mihar/l, so more than anything I want to see if the manga will be giving any focus to the other Spade members' introductions into the crew. We'll see!!

When Deuce awoke the next morning, it was not to the sensation of his stomach seeming to attempt to digest itself. Nor was it to the feeling of a throat so parched it felt raw, where even drawing breath hurt.

There was no dizziness. No aching muscles, or throbbing head, or that unique, intense sense of wonder that he had woken up at all. Death was not hanging over him with its scythe glinting in the warm morning breeze, poised to call and claim another life from Sixis, its partner in crime, for the first time since becoming stranded.

Thus, lucidity dawned easily rather than snapping to or drawing in sluggish and pained. Warmth engulfed him, although this morning it was comfortable rather than dry and prickly, reminding him of those winter mornings back at the house where he would snuggle deeper under thick comforters and promise himself he’d only rest for five more minutes.

So, naturally, Deuce ducked his face down into his imaginary comforter – the one that his mind was most convincingly telling him was wrapped around his body, too, pleasantly – and nuzzled into the soft warmth he discovered under his chin.

Indulgence set in – a deep inhale was pulled through his nose, the fluffy heat of the comforter tickling him—

— _fluffy heat?_ —

—and wakefulness came sprinting for him, tearing his eyes open because _since when did he have a comforter on Sixis?_ And one that smelled of what he could only label as sunshine and, unmistakably, _hair?_

Of course he didn’t have a comforter. Of course he wasn’t wrapped in soft sheets nor rested upon pillows of duck down. He was covered in sand once again, hair a furious mess from where he’d apparently attempted to bury his head, and, most worryingly, he had Ace cuddled up to him in his arms, legs wound around his and breathing gently against his collarbone.

Realistically speaking, Deuce should have simply untangled Ace from himself, sat up, dusted himself off, and asked him, nice and relaxed-like, what the fuck he thought he was doing. He should have waited and acted sensibly, saving whatever lingering respect he could possibly still command post-snotty breakdown and attempted murder.

But instead, Deuce panicked.

Completely.

“Oh my god,” he gasped, trying to back away from his sleeping companion but only succeeding in dragging him across the sand with him, “oh my _god_ , Ace, what’re you—what—Ace?!”

It was pretty obvious _what_. Ace was cuddling him and must have been doing so for quite some time, given that he had clearly been asleep too. Now, though, under the flailing and the hands at his shoulders trying to pry him off without success, Ace groaned and yawned loudly as if Deuce’s efforts to shove him off were little more bothersome than a cat pawing at its human for its breakfast.

“Mornin’, Deuce,” Ace mumbled sleepily, blinking in the face of Deuce’s distress, “you sleep well?”

Deuce spluttered, having no idea how the hell to answer that properly. He _had_ slept well, thanks to the food, water, and warmth of the bonfire, but now— _now_ —

“You’re too close,” he said frantically, straining away from Ace’s freckled face that was far, far, _far_ too close for comfort, “l-let _go_ already, I don’t—you’re—this is _so_ —”

Ace blinked blearily at him, although Deuce’s discomfort was beginning to sink into his sleepy mind, for he at least unhooked his leg from where it had tucked into the backs of Deuce’s knees.

“Ah, sorry,” Ace apologised, stifling another yawn, “I woke up a couple hours ago and you were shivering in your sleep, so I thought I’d warm you up.”

Had he been? Seriously? How embarrassing.

“Did the bonfire go out?” Ace nodded in reply. Deuce looked away quickly, thoroughly uncomfortable with this. “You couldn’t have lit it again?”

“We burned through all the firewood,” Ace pointed out reasonably, _finally_ unwinding himself from Deuce properly and shuffling to sit up on his knees; Deuce scrambled away a couple of feet, certain that he was red all the way up to his hairline, heart slamming to his ribs hard enough to be audible, surely. “Sorry, I always used to cuddle with my brother when it got cold – it’s a really effective way of sharing body heat, and Sixis is freezing before the sun’s fully risen.” He cocked his head to one side, a small frown dipping his brows as he watched Deuce make a scene of brushing away the sand that obstinately clung to his coat. “Didn’t you used to cuddle with _your_ brother when it got cold?”

Deuce barked a harsh, shrill laugh at such a ludicrous idea, unable to stop himself in time to suppress it. Cuddle with _him?_ Not even in his wildest dreams. His brother had done all in his power to pretend they weren’t even related, never mind ever willingly touching him in any manner. In fact, now that he thought about it, Deuce wasn’t certain he could recall the last time he had even been in physical contact with his brother… or anyone else, for that matter. Before Ace, of course.

“No,” was his curt, insufficient reply, trying his damn hardest not to look at Ace’s worried expression as he got to his feet, “I didn’t have a good relationship with my brother. And you didn’t do anything wrong, by the way,” he added when the guilt got too much, directing him to alleviate Ace’s concern, “I’m just… I wasn’t expecting to wake up with you w-wrapped around me like that. I’m sorry I overreacted.”

But he hadn’t disliked it. That was the strange part, the part that occupied his thoughts as they dusted off the sand as much as they could, Ace seeming content with Deuce’s short explanation and apology. It had, at first, felt really rather lovely to be cuddled up with Ace.

Deuce shrugged to himself, stretching and turning out to the sea. It didn’t take a genius to figure out why he felt that way.

The plan, Ace announced as he nudged his last bottle of water to Deuce’s cheek (causing him to yelp in surprise), was that they would first get their food and water sorted before starting on any sort of training. So, before Deuce could begin to explain his ideas for Ace’s training that he’d come up with while trying to drift off the night previous, Ace was bounding off back into the forest, happily calling to Deuce that he was going to go get the water he’d left collecting at the cliff face yesterday.

“I wasn’t expecting that boat to work,” he shouted back over his shoulder as he crashed into the undergrowth, his grin visible even from Deuce’s distance, “so yesterday morning I set up a collection for today! Go ahead and finish what we’ve got!”

Regardless, it seemed unwise to completely drain their remaining water without definite proof that more was on the way, so Deuce made sure to leave enough in Ace’s bottle for him on his return. Anything could have gone wrong at the cliff face, and Deuce couldn’t stomach the thought of being the one to leave Ace completely without water.

He needn’t have worried, though, because within half an hour Ace was back, making far too much noise for someone who had grown up living in the wilderness should have done.

“It’s okay,” Ace beamed at Deuce when he pointed this out, triumphantly brandishing two full bottles of water at him, “there’s nothing on this island that could hunt us or steal our supplies, so there’s no point in trying to stay quiet.”

Well, that was true, as far as Deuce could verify for himself – nothing except those nasty biting ants and the gulls that didn’t seem to want to kindly fall dead out of the sky for them.

“What’re you making?” Ace asked, dropping down to sit far too close to Deuce once again, seeming not to notice how Deuce edged his knee away from Ace’s.

For while Ace had been gathering the water, Deuce had come up with a way to make himself useful and actually contribute to their survival package vacation. Beside him lay several long branches that he’d fashioned into spears with the knife that Ace had left behind (along with his hat and shirt, for reasons that Deuce couldn’t even start to fathom), and he was halfway through working on yet another.

“You said we were going to try fishing again,” Deuce said, returning to filing away at the end of the branch, “so I thought I’d get a head start on tools to do so. Oh,” he gave Ace an uncertain, searching look, “unless you meant we should try making nets instead?”

But Ace didn’t look at all like he was about to start berating Deuce’s efforts. In fact, Ace looked just about as happy as Deuce had ever seen him, appearing to be positively delighted with Deuce’s handiwork so far – and that _certainly_ didn’t lift Deuce’s already sky-high mood right up through the clouds.

“Great!” Ace praised, leaning across Deuce’s lap and taking up one of the spears to inspect it. “That’s such a great idea, Deuce! I broke my others a few days ago. A net probably wouldn’t be able to take any of the fishes’ weight – they’re all kinda big around here, I found – so spears are definitely the way to go!”

It made the hairs on the back of his neck stand on end as if he had been electrocuted; made him sit up a little straighter, nerves jolting, teeth clenching something fierce to hold back a surprised laugh. He’d done something _right_ , and, furthermore, Ace was _happy_ about his decision.

He couldn’t quite believe it, didn’t want to tempt fate and do anything that could invite ridicule or rebuke, no matter how certain he was that he wasn’t going to receive either from Ace, and definitely not for something as insignificant as _this_ … but he couldn’t help himself. The praise poured too sweet to a tongue once only accustomed to the bitterness of disappointment and failure, and Deuce very nearly choked on swallowing his saliva because oh, he could _really_ get on board with this.

“Did I do okay on the points?” He asked anxiously, carefully turning the spear in Ace’s hands to bring the spiked end to Ace’s attention. “What do you think? Would sticking them in your flames for a few seconds make them more effective?”

Ace hummed in concentration for a moment, rolling the spear over in his palm to look it over. “Yeah,” he said slowly, “fire would make it harder, but it also makes wood more brittle, so… I dunno. I never bothered back home, and I caught plenty there. Oh, no,” he leaned in as he noticed Deuce’s expression dropping slightly, the threat of failure creeping back in, “that’s a great suggestion, though! We’ll do it for our boat, okay? I’ll blast the thing and then you can throw sand over it to put it out – should make for a perfect boat!” He slapped Deuce on the back, knocking the air from his lungs in a rush. “See? You _do_ know shit about survival!”

Truth was, Deuce only knew about this from reading Brag Men cover to cover hundreds of times – the method had been featured several times, although admittedly his beloved author had seemed to alternate between using the carbonising method and leaving it well alone, his decisions on the matter unhelpfully never making it into the pages of his log.

“I know a little of the theories, I guess,” Deuce said modestly, unable to meet Ace’s approving smile. “Is there anything else you’d do differently?”

“Yeah, just one,” Ace nodded, gingerly testing the point with the tip of his index finger. “For fish, a serrated edge’s more effective. Gets stuck in them better, means they can’t use the water to their advantage to dislodge it. Something to do with how they wriggle.” Deuce snorted as Ace demonstrated with his free hand, flapping it in wild imitation of a speared fish. “Nah, you should do it,” he added cheerfully when Deuce made to hand his knife back to him, “you’ve never done it before, right?” Ugh, how did he know? Was Deuce really that much of a blundering fool when it came to woodwork? Actually, he didn’t want that question answered. “The only way you’ll learn is by practicing, and I swear I’m a good teacher. It’s super easy too, just make loads of little nicks in the point and you’re good. Then we can get some breakfast!”

 _Loads of little nicks_ translated into five up one side, and then another five down the opposite. To give credit where credit was due, Ace _was_ a good teacher, going patient and slow with Deuce on a topic that honestly, in hindsight, should have been easy to master. By the time he was finished cutting all of the spears his fingers ached, thumb stiff from the repetitive motion of pressing the blade into the wood in that constant upward-forward motion. But, to Deuce’s delight, Ace seemed pleased with his handiwork.

“We,” Ace said triumphantly, thrusting one of the spears out towards the gently lapping sea as if he were challenging it, “are gonna feast like _kings_ this morning.”

It didn’t seem necessary to point out that kings would definitely not _feast_ on poisonous fish that they themselves had had to catch from the sea, but Deuce grinned back at Ace all the same. “Suppose we’d better get on with it, then,” he said, the decision encouraged by a loud, eager groan from Ace’s stomach that was matched with a booming laugh from its owner.

“Suppose we had!” Ace said cheerfully, standing up and brushing sand off his shorts.

When he held out a hand to Deuce to help him to his feet also, Deuce flared up pink and stuttered something incoherent about being able to get up without Ace’s help, thank you very much. If Ace took offense to this, he didn’t show it, grinning at Deuce with his hands on his hips and deflecting the frown that Deuce flashed at him.

“Do the fish come right up to the shore?” Deuce asked in a desperate bid to stop himself from being all jittery and nervous from the mere offer of Ace’s hand extended to him. “Do we just have to stand here and wait for them, then—” he made a violent throwing motion in mid-air before looking hopefully to Ace, waiting for his assessment.

Ace hummed, drumming his fingers at his hips. “Not exactly,” he said slowly, frowning at the foamy surf that collected barely a foot away from their boots, the shore lapping lazily at the sand, “I had to wade out until the sea was up to my waist before I found any of them, then I sorta jabbed them and hauled them up.”

“Oh,” Deuce said, thinking hard, “okay, so if you do that, I can – I don’t know – take them off you and prepare them for the fire over on those flat rocks over there?” He gestured to a handy set of rocks that seemed to have been flattened down for the sole purpose of providing a smooth surface big enough to let a person lie flat – not that Deuce had been eyeing up the black rock as a potential spot for a rest later on in the day or anything.

It took a moment to catch on to why Ace looked so put out by this suggestion – took far longer than it should have done to remember that no, wait, Ace _couldn’t_ simply wade out there and demonstrate his hunting abilities. When it came back to him – when Deuce realised his mistake and sighed long and hard at his own stupidity – it left him facing a different sort of challenge. One that he didn’t particularly want to address.

So, naturally, Ace did it for him.

“You’ve never fished before, have you?” Ace asked innocently, not a hint of a sneer in his voice, yet Deuce’s mind very nastily injected a scathing tone into his own self-assessment of his skills.

“No,” Deuce said flatly, irritated once again by his total lack of ability, hoping with all his might that Ace wasn’t thinking something along the same horrifying lines that Deuce’s own mind was taking him – namely questioning why he had ever entertained the thought that he could survive alone off the back of a privileged lifestyle that he had never had any inclination towards.

“It wouldn’t be a good idea to start practicing now, in my opinion,” Ace frowned thoughtfully, the breeze lifting his dark hair to swirl about his face. “It’d be a good skill for you to learn – and it’s not hard, really, once you get the hang of it – but…”

“We can’t afford to scare off our food right now,” Deuce finished for him; Ace nodded grimly.

But then presented a problem. A problem that both seemed to acknowledge at the same time, if the silence that fell over Ace was anything to go by. Looking out at the sea, their hair ruffled by the incoming breeze that swept over them, Deuce found himself rather reluctant to voice his concern… and yet it became increasingly evident that it was something that needed addressing if they were to get this expedition underway any time soon.

“Uh,” Deuce offered unhelpfully, “so how… how’re we going to _do_ this?”

 _This_ , Deuce trusted Ace to understand, meant the fishing itself. Ace, the expert fisherman, by Deuce’s standards, could no longer go into the water. Deuce, the complete novice, _could_ go in the water, but once there, he wouldn’t be able to do anything useful. Oh, how apt.

However, Ace heaved a great, dramatic sigh and clapped Deuce on the shoulder, either missing or ignoring the flinch this produced.

“There’s only one thing for it,” Ace said in the most matter of fact tone that Deuce had heard him utter, “how strong are you?”

The question took Deuce by surprise, causing him to frown at Ace and his curiosity to lift a few notches. What did strength have to do with fishing, with his inability to accurately throw a spear, or stab a fish in the sea? Maybe – and the thought almost made Deuce snort out loud – Ace was about to ask him to abandon the spears altogether and wrestle a fish out of the water? Ah, but therein lay the problem with the poisonous scales, though—

“Reasonably, I think,” Deuce said in a bid to divert his wandering thoughts away from what he would look like if he _were_ to throw down with a fish the size of a fully grown man. “Why?”

Unconsciously, he put a palm to his abdomen, feeling the tight muscle flex under his skin on turning to Ace – muscle that he had deliberately built over the months in preparation of running away, the possibility of escape demanding that he become fit enough to be able to physically handle whatever situations he found himself in.

And Ace, Deuce couldn’t help but notice, gazed unashamedly at where Deuce touched, eyebrows raising slightly as if he were impressed by what he hadn’t spared any attention for before. That look made Deuce feel uncomfortable, almost nervous, like he was on display for Ace to judge and critique. Not that he was in any way different to Ace in this regard, luckily; Ace himself was well built, perhaps more so than Deuce, his shirt still resting forgotten on his bag at the camp, allowing for Deuce to return the appraising glances and take note of obliques that stood prominent in Ace’s sides, the firm lines of the bicep with the curiously misspelled tattoo that he _so_ wanted to ask about—

Ace folded his arms and gave a firm, resolute nod, apparently satisfied with what he saw. “Right,” he said seriously, “you’re gonna have to lift me up on your shoulders and walk us out into the sea – I’ll fish from up there, and avoid getting wet. Oh,” he added, beaming at Deuce’s bewilderment and clapping his hands together, “and take your clothes off, too.”

It was a skill, Deuce was sure, to be this cluelessly blunt. A skill that meant Ace saw nothing wrong with his statement, and one that left him pulling a puzzled expression when Deuce burst out laughing at such a ridiculous demand.

“What?” Ace asked as Deuce slapped his hands over his mouth in an attempt to shut himself up, failing spectacularly, “you gotta! You’ll get your clothes wet again if you charge in fully dressed! Do you want that?”

Okay, that was a very fair point, but—

“Then lead with _that_ ,” Deuce snickered, wiping at his eyes, “ _that_ makes sense. Demanding I strip doesn’t.”

And with that, it was settled – although Deuce wasn’t entirely sure anything he had said could constitute as agreeing to Ace’s outrageous plan. Still, though, he could see the logic in it, even if it did mean he found himself in an incredibly embarrassing and compromising situation as a result.

Shrugging off his coat and folding it up, Deuce spoke up in an attempt to lessen the weight of Ace’s gaze upon his body. It was distracting, being stared at like that, like he was little more than a piece of meat being sized up at a marketplace, and he was keen to put a stop to it.

“Have you ever tried fishing from someone else’s shoulders?” Deuce asked, fumbling with his belt a little, actively stopping himself from turning his back on Ace and trying to hide himself – the desire was a ridiculous one, given that they had already seen each other in their underwear.

“Nope, not since I was little,” Ace said happily, and, as though inspiration struck him out of a reverie, he sat back down on the sand to start tugging off his boots, “but it shouldn’t be too much harder, right? You’ll keep nice and steady for me, won’t you?”

Deuce wasn’t entirely convinced he would be able to, but decided not to voice his doubts.

Minutes later that seemed to drag on for an eternity each, Deuce found himself in what was quite possibly the most humiliating, ludicrous position he had ever taken up. Kneeling in the sand, palms spread wide and fingers fanning wider, he braced himself as Ace dithered, deciding how best to go about this. Frankly, Deuce didn’t care what he did at this point, as long as he damn well got on with it and cut the suspense, putting him out of his misery. This was torture, surely, kneeling here like some kind of donkey waiting for its master to swing a leg over and kick his flank to make him rise.

It certainly did not help that he was bare save for his underwear and Ace was decidedly _not_. He had no need to be, he had happily pointed out once flinging his boots to join his shirt and hat, keeping his shorts belted securely around his hips. No – _he_ wasn’t going to make contact with the sea, so he could stay as dressed as he saw fit… which, admittedly, did actually see him almost as bare as Deuce.

But _still_ , that wasn’t the _point_.

The sand was warm to Deuce’s forehead when he headbutted it with a resigned sigh.

On rising back up and brushing the sand from his forehead, Deuce noted Ace’s knees on either side of his head, tanned and heated as the rest of him and far, far too close for comfort. Above him stood – well – Ace in his entirety, reeling off the simple plan that he had come up with, spears in hand and swinging with his narration.

“Now, if you wanna try standing up, Deuce, I’ll hold onto you as best I can,” Ace was explaining to the back of Deuce’s head, apparently oblivious to just how humiliating Deuce found this whole ordeal, “and then you hold onto my knees and see how you get on. Okay?”

Not really.

“If you find I’m too heavy, or you don’t think you can make it into the sea, then feel free to drop me – I won’t mind.”

“Right,” Deuce said through gritted teeth, shifting his feet below himself to better brace, “let’s try this.”

And so he rose, becoming acutely, _painfully_ aware of the sensation of Ace’s thighs touching his shoulders, of Ace’s ass meeting the back of his neck, and – oh, dear god – just how _hot_ he was, even through his shorts. It was mortifying, although Deuce couldn’t quite pinpoint why _he_ was so horrified by this and not Ace, who seemed perfectly at peace with being lifted up into the air like a child astride his parent’s shoulders.

“That’s it,” Ace encouraged once Deuce was stood, abdominal muscles working furiously to keep himself upright and steady on the sand, “nicely done.” Deuce very nearly yelped when warm, searching fingers smoothed down along his jawline, assumedly in an attempt to comfort and reassure him, although doing little more than making him wish he could just drop Ace again and go hide somewhere recluse and quiet.

Instead, though, Deuce took hold of Ace’s knees alongside his face, willing himself to not lose his head to something as stupid as this. When he had set off from his hometown to begin a life of adventuring, he certainly hadn’t foreseen getting his damned head between the legs of a pirate as a possibility… and definitely not in circumstances such as these.

“If this doesn’t work,” Deuce growled, taking his first step into the surprisingly warm sea, focusing on how it bubbled and frothed over his bare foot rather than further acknowledging the sensation of Ace’s thighs clenching around his neck, of his heels digging into his sides, “if we don’t manage to get any fish by doing this, then I’m gonna—gonna—”

“Drop me in the sea and leave me to drown?” Ace offered, his smile clear in his voice.

Deuce sighed. “Well, seeing as you suggested it…” he said, taking another tentative step, followed by another.

Ace giggled and, _awfully_ , patted Deuce’s hair in an almost affectionate manner, which definitely didn’t make Deuce’s heart clench in the way it was growing used to doing whenever Ace graced him with physical touches. The effect was lost, though, the moment Ace decided to playfully cry, “onward, steed!” and clicked his tongue as if encouraging a particularly stubborn horse to do as it was told.

All in all, it wasn’t as dreadful an ordeal as it could have been. Wading out into the sea became easier the deeper they went, Deuce finding himself feeling more secure in his footing once the sea reached over his knees and converged around his thighs. When it got deep enough to reach his navel, however, was when Ace began to get uncomfortable and started squirming, thigh muscles bunching solid about Deuce’s ears as he lifted his feet up as high as he could.

“I don’t wanna touch it,” Ace moaned, clinging to Deuce’s head like a particularly annoying limpet and leaning to better look at the level of the sea up his post, “it feels all weird, touching sea water now. Please don’t let it splash me, Deuce, please.”

“You’re fine,” Deuce reassured him, giving him an awkward pat on his knee, “is this deep enough?”

“Yeah, I think so.”

And so they waited.

And waited.

And while they waited in silence, both independently coming to the same conclusion that making noise would be counterproductive in this situation, Deuce’s mind veered off the beaten track of predictability and ventured onto the far murkier trails of speculation and guesswork, as the mind so often did when forced to be still.

“Ace,” he hissed, barely whispering above the gentle hush of the sea.

“Yeah?” Ace breathed back, body rigid on Deuce’s shoulders, the first of his spears poised and ready.

“You said the fish are poisonous on contact, didn’t you?”

“Uh-huh. That’s why we gotta cook ‘em properly before we eat them. Their scales and their flesh’re both really nasty business.”

Deuce swallowed thickly, searching the sea, the cloudless sky making the sun reflect in shimmering intervals back up into his watering eyes. “What would happen if one happened to brush up against my leg right now, for example?”

At once, those thighs squeezed him that little bit tighter as if Ace’s fear of falling had suddenly tripled in intensity – which, in hindsight, Deuce supposed it _had_.

“Why?” He asked nervously, the fingers of his free hand spinning almost painfully tight into Deuce’s pale hair, “why? Why, Deuce? Did you feel one? Did something brush against you?”

“No,” Deuce said calmly, although he held onto Ace’s knees a little tighter all the same, driven by the palpable fear rising off his companion, “I was just wondering—”

“Well don’t!” Ace whined, readjusting his grip on the aloft spear and bringing it just a little too close to Deuce’s head for comfort. The others clattered astride Ace’s lap, bumping to the back of Deuce’s head. “I hadn’t thought of that! _Why_ hadn’t I thought of that? Ah, crap, you shoulda kept your pants on… Don’t let anything touch you, okay? You won’t be able to stand upright if it does.”

“Easier said than done,” Deuce pointed out, earning a panicked inhale from Ace.

“We’re both goners if you get rammed by a fish,” Ace groaned, raising an undignified snort from Deuce.

“Of all the ways you could have phrased that—”

“I mean it, Deuce!” Ace said, voice beginning to border on shrill despite his efforts to keep quiet, “I don’t wanna die because some dumb fish decided to get a bit too friendly with you!”

“Shh!”

Ace shut up immediately, body going taut with suspense at Deuce’s hissed command. The moment Ace spotted it too – that enormous shadow gliding lazily towards them, unaware of the danger it was in – Deuce felt it. Felt how Ace froze, thighs locking to tremble and shiver with adrenaline – how his fingers left his hair, sliding out of contact to instead rest splayed on top of his head, most distractingly, like he was doing so for better balance.

“Don’t move,” Ace breathed, and Deuce could almost _feel_ his heart racing through his fingertips, “don’t move an inch. It’s coming closer.”

It was a shame neither of them had thought of bringing bait – in the excitement of stripping off and then lifting Ace up to stand 9 feet tall, both had quite forgotten all about bringing something with them to entice any fish they found to swim in closer to them. But, luckily for them, this wasn’t needed with this target. Most luckily – and again, Deuce was struck by the thought of how they were almost becoming _too_ lucky here on Sixis – the fish meandered on over ever closer, unwittingly bringing itself into Ace’s deadly range.

“That’s it,” Deuce heard Ace murmur, saw his hand readjust ever so slightly on the spear within his periphery, “just a little… closer… c’mon…”

And then, quick as a bolt of lightning, Ace struck. The spear shot through the air in a blur and pierced the fish in the back; Ace’s forward momentum threatened to overbalance Deuce for one horrifying, heart-stopping moment, but Ace leaned back just enough to counter.

“You did it!” Deuce cried breathlessly, the seawater sloshing dangerously around him from their movement.

But they weren’t in the clear yet. In fact, they were mere seconds away from being in the shit. The fish, flailing, was starting to regain its senses in the split second it took Deuce to right his footing and cling desperately to Ace’s knees, huffing a small laugh of disbelief that Ace had actually succeeded.

The second spear whistled through the air in conjunction with Ace’s grunt of exertion, hitting its mark dead on and piercing the fish’s head, as far as Deuce could tell. Either way, that seemed to do the trick, making their breakfast slow down to almost a stop and present itself safe for Deuce to bend as much as he dared to, lifting it clear from the sea by the two long, deadly embedded spears.

It was heavy – incredibly so, and far more than Deuce would have expected of a fish – but, with Ace’s encouragement and excited wriggling on his shoulders (that distracted more than helped), Deuce heaved the huge fish clear of the sea with a hefty grunt of his own.

“This thing weighs nearly as much as you,” Deuce hissed through gritted teeth, not finding how Ace wrapped his free arm around his head to be in any way helpful whatsoever, “jeez, how am I supposed to carry both you and this back to shore?”

“You’ll be fine,” Ace snickered, seeing fit to bend and playfully smack Deuce’s taut, straining chest, much to his horror, “I have full confidence that you’ll shock and amaze me with your strength.” Deuce wasn’t entirely convinced that he agreed, yet he was powerless to the smile that bloomed across his lips, thankfully unseen by Ace. “I’ve been meaning to ask – what did you used to do back home, anyway? How’d you get so fit? I thought you were a bookish sorta guy?”

Was now really the time for this sort of conversation? Or, in fact, any conversation at all? Even turning on the spot, hoisting the dual weight of the fish and Ace, had Deuce’s chest constricting tight like a hot band had been squeezed down onto it.

“I left home to become an adventurer, but I was in med school,” Deuce said with tense effort, doing his best not to start panting as he waded back towards the shoreline because now he had _expectations_ to fulfil, “learning to be a doctor. My whole—whole family are—d-doctors, so it was expected of me.”

If Deuce could have known that this sentence would backfire in the silliest, most ridiculous way possible, he would have held his tongue. He would have told Ace that they could talk about it on dry land, away from the threat of the sea, when he was out from underneath Ace’s weight and not carrying a fish that he was beginning to think actually weighed _more_ than Ace did on what were effectively two enormous chopsticks. Deuce would have perhaps asked Ace something in response, and encouraged _him_ to chatter so that Deuce could focus on, say, not dropping him.

But no.

Most unfortunately, Deuce did not factor in the possibility of Ace unexpectedly going into absolute transports of delight at this revelation of his background, and he instantly regretted this oversight.

You’re a _doctor?!”_ Ace squawked, wriggling around so much that Deuce had to stand still, arms shaking with the weight of the fish. “Are you really? A doctor? Really? That’s _so_ cool! You’re a _doctor_ and you’re _here_ and—”

“ _A med student_ ,” Deuce corrected with immense effort, calf muscles screaming in protest as he fought against Ace’s sudden glee, “a _failed_ med student. I dropped out; I didn’t even complete the first—”

“I can’t _believe_ you’re a _doctor_ ,” Ace interrupted, quite beside himself, grabbing Deuce under the chin as he swayed precariously on his shoulders, “that’s _amazing_ , Deuce, you’re like, mega clever—”

“I’m _not_ ,” crap, it was getting harder and harder to stand, and his back was starting to hurt with how Ace _refused_ to sit still, “and why is this so shocking to you?”

“It’s awesome! I’ve never met a doctor so young before!” Ace cried, and— _fuck_ —he pulled at Deuce under his chin, forcing his head back until the back of his skull bumped to Ace’s… abdomen? No, material. Definitely material.

 _Material_.

Deuce swore he blacked out for an entire second on realising just where he was touching.

“Let go!” He ground out, jaw constricted by Ace’s hold, in very real danger of biting his tongue. “Ace, I’m—your—crotch—”

“Huh? My what?”

And suddenly he was looking up into those dark eyes, upside-down, silhouetted against the brilliant blue sky and spanning the receding pinholes of Deuce’s vision.

He felt himself flush and, even worse, felt the spears slip from his grip as it relaxed, his concentration thoroughly diverted up to Ace’s eyes.

And then—

Then he was falling.

Backwards.

Overbalanced by the loss of the fish; equilibrium gone to the pull of Ace’s fingers cupping his chin.

And down they went with a colossal splash, with a combined shriek that cleared their section of the island of all other fish within a two-mile radius, easily.

* * *

It had been a task to get Ace out of the sea this time, to say the least. The problem that Deuce found was that when under the water and being buoyed along by the tide, both Ace and fish seemed unconsciously intent on drifting away from him in opposite directions.

When he had resurfaced from his underwater collapse with a coughed-up gasp and cheeks redder than the sunburn he was starting to get on his chest, Deuce had had to make an immediate decision: Ace first, or fish first? Friend, or food?

One was dead, the other about to be.

Guess that made the choice for him.

It was to a chorus of great hacking coughs that Ace had been gracelessly deposited on the sand on shore, spitting up sea water and wiping his face with the backs of his hands. By the time he had managed to struggle up into a sitting position, Deuce was already back crashing through the gentle waves again, searching for their precious meal three feet under. If they lost it – if they had to go through that ridiculous humiliation again so soon all because Ace hadn’t been able to contain his delight at learning that his companion was a university dropout – then Deuce was almost convinced that he would seriously offer to barbecue _Ace_ in the fish’s place.

However, no such death threats were necessary, for Deuce was able to locate the fish with relatively surprising ease, owing to planting a foot directly onto one of the protruding spears and almost losing his balance yet again.

“Here we go,” Deuce grunted some moments later, heaving the dripping fish up and onto one of the flat black rocks that so did seem to want to offer itself up as a worktop of sorts, “give me that knife of yours and I’ll get to work.”

He could do more than just whittle away at a bunch of spearheads – even if this would be another case of _first time for everything_ – and he was going to prove it.

Ace had other ideas, though.

It was with a pride near mortally wounded that Deuce reluctantly gave up the gallant task of preparing and cutting up the fish. Though he hadn’t mentioned anything of the sort, Ace (correctly) guessed that Deuce had never before in his life descaled or skinned a fish – or anything, for that matter.

“It’s probably not the best idea to start practicing on something that could kill you if you touch it,” Ace said with a kind pat to Deuce’s damp arm, smiling kindly at the embarrassed frown this earned him. “I’m sure you’ll get the chance to practice descaling fish at some point, but for now I think I should do it. If it’s alright with you, I’ll wear those handy gloves again and get to work on it – oh, hey, why don’t you gather some firewood, seeing as we’re all out?”

With his lesser role designated for him, Deuce trudged back up to the forest lining the sparkling sand, sighing a heavy groan as he did so.

(He then doubled back to hastily get dressed, quite forgetting how bare he was until his foot made painful contact with the crunchy littering of dead leaves and who knew what else on the forest floor.)

(If Ace noticed, he certainly didn’t make it obvious. Thank goodness.)

He didn’t just collect branches and leaves suitable for a bonfire, though. Since he was there – and since he was absolutely determined to make himself every bit as useful as Ace in whatever way possible – Deuce also heaved up some far bigger and heavier branches than were necessary for getting their breakfast cooking. Ace’s training was due after the fishing saga came to a close, and while tiny, thin twigs would make for the final target practice, the larger – and thus easier to hit – branches that were currently causing Deuce’s arms to tremble would serve well for initially training Ace’s aim.

That persistent cloud of inadequacy loomed over Deuce’s head throughout his stint in the forest, keeping an eye on the floor lest he accidentally run into any more of those awful ants. Though he was reasonably certain that yes, Ace was being totally truthful in his claims that it didn’t matter, that he wasn’t negatively judging Deuce’s lack of skills, his shortcomings still bore his father’s voice when they oh-so helpfully listed themselves on repeat in his mind.

“I’m not completely useless,” Deuce muttered without preamble on his stomped return a good ten minutes later, kneeling in the sand to arrange the firewood before Ace could take that task off him too, “I know the theory of everything we’ve had to do so far, at the very least.”

“And that’s great!” Ace beamed at him from his seat on the black rock, the fish neatly separated out into flanks, tail, head, and spine already, the job thoroughly well done. “That’s a great place to start! Did you read about them or something?”

Deuce nodded, pulling an arm over his sweating brow, and passed several long, thin branches that were to serve for spikes to bake the fish on up to Ace when he waved for them. “There’re a lot of these survival skills documented in adventure logs,” he said, “particularly in one called Brag Men. Have you heard of it?”

“Nope,” Ace said cheerfully, swinging his legs over the edge of the rock in a fashion reminiscent of a gleeful child, the heels of his boots thunking to the side of it, “we didn’t have all that many books where I came from, and I didn’t really read much. Reading’s not much fun. Oh, but I _can_ read,” he added when Deuce’s face fell, once again shocked by the implied total opposites in upbringing despite their shared fate here on Sixis, “this lady called Makino taught me and Luffy how to read. She made sure of it. But I don’t enjoy it.” He paused, brow furrowed and lips parted as if he were debating saying something, but before Deuce could offer anything in response to this, he concluded with, “I like listening to stories, though,” in what he clearly intended to be an offhand sort of manner.

“Oh,” Deuce said uselessly, dropping his focus back down to the bonfire to pointlessly tidy up what he had already meticulously arranged, his heart suddenly hammering a million miles in his throat at the suddenly offered prospect of being _useful_ , “well, I like reading stories. Out loud,” he added with half a glance up into the intense stare that he knew to be waiting for him.

“Huh,” was Ace’s vague response.

“And I’ve got a copy of Brag Men in my bag, as it happens,” Deuce continued, focusing on the little pattern of a flame he drew in the sand below the tent of sticks, “it somehow survived my boat capsizing on my first day here… It’s a good book. It’s got… got lots of interesting tales in it.”

He wasn’t going to be the one to say it outright, not when the possibility of rejection hung like a scythe over his neck.

Luckily for him, though, he didn’t have to – should have _known_ that he would never have had to.

“If I teach you some hands-on survival stuff,” Ace said slowly, busying himself with poking one of the long sticks into a hunk of fish, “would you maybe—if you’d be up for it, I mean—seeing as you _like_ to read out loud… would you wanna read it to me? As repayment. Fill in each other’s blanks and stuff.”

Ah, there was that phrase again that Ace had used last night… the one that had sent heat washing over Deuce’s cheeks and swelling up into something foreign, yet gratefully welcomed, in his chest, just as it managed to do again now, catching him off guard.

A part of Deuce hoped that it affected Ace as acutely as it did him.

Yet that same part of him rationally knew that this would not, and never would be, the case in someone who already knew what it meant to be cared about by another.

“And help complete each other?” Deuce said with a smile, also repeating his line that he had offered back to Ace without hesitation the night previous, finally looking back up at him perched on the rock.

And seeing…

Seeing Ace looking at him with bright eyes, rapt with attention, leaning forward ever so slightly as if to get closer, somehow, back down to where Deuce sat in the sand.

“C-Complete each other’s knowledge bases, I mean,” Deuce corrected himself with a stutter, “since we’re both lacking in opposing areas—”

“Oh, yeah, I know what you meant,” Ace said quickly, looking suddenly flustered, like he was under a glaring spotlight, the moment instantly shattered and lost, “yeah, I mean, if you wouldn’t mind, you don’t _have_ to—”

“No!” Deuce spluttered, his chest constricting with urgency, “no, I would love to do that! Are you sure _you_ wouldn’t mind—?”

“Same back to you!” Ace laughed a high, falsely airy note. “I’d love to! And I’m a _great_ teacher!”

And so it was settled. Like for like; imparting a piece of themselves onto each other to create something greater, more rounded, and _better_.

Deuce wished in that instant that he had his notebook on him, the urge to scribble out the most awfully sappy of lines in messy shorthand one that was almost overpowering. Ace’s smile in that moment – one of complete elation, of a man brilliantly eager for what only Deuce could provide for him – was something to be documented in intricate detail and never forgotten.

Instead, though, he ducked his head into a nod, burying down the itch to take pen to paper and begin the log he still had yet to start. It wasn’t his fault he hadn’t started on the one thing he had set out to do, really, was it? He had, after all, been ever so slightly preoccupied with not dying until just last night, and today so far had been dominated by fish, the sea, and Ace’s crotch.

Deuce coughed into his fist, fighting down the inclination to laugh at the memory of Ace’s upside-down wide-eyed terror the split second before they had been dragged underwater.

With a little grunt of effort and a tap of his heels to the rock surface, Ace hopped down with the fish all perfectly sliced up and speared on the sticks, ready for cooking. Passing a couple to Deuce to free up his hand, Ace frowned in concentration to set his fist on fire once again and, following a little patience, the bonfire sprang up into life. The beaming grin that Ace flashed at Deuce was one that made his heart _soar_ , carrying with it that quiet hum of happiness that Deuce was fast associating with whatever friendship was fabled to feel like.

A promise between the two; an exchange of abilities, labelled as necessary for growth, yet overtly offered as a means to feel the second-hand joy of another.

Well, that was how Deuce felt, and thus how he actively chose to interpret Ace’s good mood. There was every possibility that that wasn’t factoring into Ace’s smile, or the tune he hummed to himself as he staked the spiked fish into the sand to cook… but for perhaps the first time in his life, Deuce couldn’t find the evidence needed in Ace’s actions to begin to doubt himself.

How perfectly lovely.

While the fish baked over the merrily crackling bonfire, Ace again brought up the subject of Deuce’s failed attempt at a medical degree. It was a sore topic, truth be told, and not really one that Deuce could speak of favorably, but Ace was so intensely absorbed in what he had to say that it felt rather mean to deprive him of the subject entirely. Although _why_ Ace was so over-the-top interested in what Deuce could only see as a miserable experience and the apex of all that had made his life before Sixis completely worthless, he really had no idea.

“It’s just _so_ cool,” Ace breathed when Deuce asked about his fascination, “dedicating your life to helping others like that… It’s really noble.”

Deuce snorted something pained and derisive, though waved a hand dismissively when Ace looked confused at his reaction.

“I didn’t do it for some wonderful, grand reason like that,” he explained, suddenly seized by the fervent wish that he _had_ pursued a medical career for reasons linked only with selflessness and a heart big enough to encompass the plights of all the sick and injured – or at the very least, had learned how to reel off great filthy lies straight to Ace’s eager face. “I did it because I wasn’t given a choice.”

“How come?”

It made his heart hurt, looking up from the fire to see pain at his expense in Ace’s eyes. Hurt to see care there – care that he had no right taking pleasure in receiving, given Ace’s incomparably shitty circumstances handed down to him by _his_ father. Yet it filled him; made him feel lighter than air, somehow, to have such openly genuine concern directed at him through those gentle gray eyes. Ace’s capacity to care significantly exceeded Deuce’s own, and though Deuce was already acutely aware of this fact, he couldn’t find it within himself to dislike being so earnestly reminded of it.

So, without a shred of further hesitation, he told Ace everything.

 _Everything_.

From his earliest memory of his father’s discipline all the way through to the night he had escaped from that mansion he had only grudgingly called a home. The expectation for social compliance; the demands set upon him as a boy to _do well_ , to learn and to recite and to perform for the masses of his father’s associates through exams and projects, through excellence and achievement, at the expense of personal happiness and individual identity. How Deuce before _Deuce_ had never been a singular person in his own right, but forever treated as an extension of his father. Where the reason to exist was to serve his father’s social standing in a higher-class society; where the wishes of the boy were of no importance in comparison to the gains of the father.

And gain the father did not through the youngest son. Living up to his father’s standards had been impossible for Deuce, he explained, for the very simple reason of not being _bright_ enough. Oh, he could retain information just fine; applying knowledge and theory to real life situations wasn’t all that difficult for the most part, either. The problem, Deuce told Ace, was not his memory, nor his ability to think – it was something far more childish than that.

There was no _love_ in his studies; no reward that held any meaning for Deuce as a child, as a teenager; and certainly no passion for the subject. Medicine and human anatomy were all well and good – were simple things to pick up, memorize, and recite when needed – but that was the extent of it.

“It didn’t interest me in the same way that stories of adventures did,” Deuce said, watching Ace for any signs of rejection or disagreement with what he had revealed. “I can tell you anything you’d ever want to know about arteries, or organs, or the individual names of the bones in your hands – but I don’t _care_ about it. But then again, you won’t find many doctors who’re into their subject, heart and soul. They do it despite that because they’re damn well clever enough to not let their idiotic fancies affect their career prospects. Does that make sense?”

Ace briefly looked like he was going to contest this. Instead, he just nodded slowly, which Deuce took as permission to continue.

He spoke only briefly of his brother, but it was more than enough to once and for all convince Ace that not all brothers shared a bond like he had with Luffy back home. With _his_ brother – three years older, three times as bright, as had been sneered at him by family and associates alike throughout his life – there had been no cuddling. There had been no shared baths. There had been no playing pretend, no sneaking into each other’s rooms to whisper and giggle in the dead of night, and certainly no love to speak of.

For there had been no love at all in his life. Though Deuce couldn’t bring himself to say so quite as bleakly as that, on glancing up at Ace for what felt like the millionth time that morning, he knew he understood the thinly veiled implications that he was alluding to.

There had been no love. No care. No questions posed to the teenaged sons about what _they_ would like to do with their lives; no freedom to become themselves outside of the molds that had been constructed for them since before their births.

“Though, of course,” Deuce said dispassionately, turning one of the pieces of fish around by the stick to bake its other side, “my brother was happy to fill the role our father made for him. He was brilliantly intelligent and had enough charisma to make up for my total lack of it.”

Ace hummed in thought, and when Deuce looked back up at him again, he was a little surprised to find that Ace had at last dropped his gaze to the fire.

“Did you ever ask him if he was happy?” Ace asked tentatively, like he wasn’t sure he should be putting forward what could be a highly personal question. “Or did his success just look like happiness?”

“I don’t know,” Deuce admitted, “I avoided talking to him as much as possible.” And honestly? He couldn’t say he cared either way; the fact that Ace _did_ care didn’t come as much of a surprise, though. When Ace didn’t answer, Deuce filled the silence with an awkward, “so… yeah. I’m not a doctor, so don’t call me one, okay? If someone were to overhear you and get the wrong idea, it could end up landing us in serious trouble.”

And with that, the tension that had settled over them thanks to the impromptu story time snapped and dissipated in an instant, ushered away by Ace’s bright laughter.

“Who’s going to hear us out here?” He snorted. “There’s no one around except for you and me. Oh!” His eyes positively _shone_ with sudden excitement, “do you mean there’re more people on Sixis? Do they just not wanna join us or something?”

“What? No,” Deuce frowned at the absurdity of such a suggestion, “no, there’s definitely no one else here besides us—”

“That’s what I thought until I found you, so we _could_ be wrong, y’know—”

“I meant when we get to the next island,” Deuce said hurriedly, cutting off Ace’s tangent train of thought, “where there’ll be lots of people and lots of potential implications tied to announcing someone’s a doctor.”

Understanding lit up Ace’s face like a cloud drifting away from in front of the sun, and Deuce, strangely, felt his own mood brighten right along with him.

“Oh, I see,” Ace said, “okay, well in that case, I’ll make sure not to say a word about it while we’re still together – how does that sound?”

Ah, and just as suddenly as it had arrived, that ray of sunshine that had fallen across Deuce’s mood dulled again, leaving him aching with what felt awfully like loss. _While they were still together?_ That sounded remarkably like Ace intended for them to split up the moment their survival no longer depended entirely on each other… and that was absolutely not the direction Deuce had settled on since waking, the decision not even presenting itself as one, as such, but more like a happily anticipated and expected conclusion coming as nothing of a surprise at the end of a well-loved novel.

Yet Ace’s own tale of Sixis apparently didn’t conclude in the same way as Deuce’s did.

… _Not yet_ , Deuce’s optimism whispered a shaky breath, stunted and feeble as it was. _Not **yet**_.

“But just for the record,” Ace spoke again, and in his words ran something indefinably soft that Deuce couldn’t quite put his finger on, yet took comfort in, “if it’s okay for me to say something like this… I don’t think you failed med school because you weren’t smart enough. I don’t think intelligence had anything to do with it at all.”

It was with this cryptic sentence (though, given the barest of thought, perhaps not so cryptic after all) that Ace abandoned the conversation with a little flourish of his wrist, bringing a piece of staked fish sailing close enough to Deuce's cheek that he could feel the heat pouring off it.

“Onto happier thoughts!” Ace said brightly, grinning broad enough to light up whatever darkness was threatening to eclipse Deuce's otherwise good mood. “Onto baked fish, and lots of it!”

The fish, to their delight, was _delicious._ Somewhat bland and lacking in seasoning, naturally, it wasn't exactly to the standards that one might expect back home – but out here, under the sun, atop the sand, in the company of Ace... flavor stopped mattering in the same way it used to. Following Ace's first bite as permission to stuff himself until his cheeks were bulging, Deuce vaguely wondered if perhaps from now on, everything he tasted in Ace’s company would be the most fantastic thing he'd ever had in his life.

Once their meal was finished off with an unexpected word of thanks from Ace for the fish they'd eaten, Ace kicked sand up over the bonfire to extinguish it as Deuce stretched with a deep groan.

“Oh, hold still,” Ace said, blotting out the sun as he bent down towards Deuce, “you've got a bit of fish on your cheek.”

Deuce's breath did not stall under that gentle swipe of thumb to blazing pink skin. It did not. Nor did he find it physically impossible to tear his gaze from Ace's in that brief moment, memorizing without conscious effort the curve of Ace's smile, the pattern of freckles that adorned cheeks and nose both, the sand that clung to his skin despite their best efforts to shake it all off.

It surprised Deuce far more than it surprised Ace when he reached out in kind, thumbing away what he could bring himself to touch.

“Sand,” he mumbled under Ace's questioning look, “I don't think any of your fish ended up anywhere other than in your mouth.”

Ace threw back his head and laughed.

“Probably not!”

And so, with only a slight interruption in the form of Ace shrugging his shirt back on to better protect against the sun's climb into the sky, training began at last.

It was a simple setup, Deuce explained as he staked out a handful of the larger of collected branches: for today, all Ace had to do was point, aim, and fire off a little fireball from his fingertips. Hitting the correct branch was, obviously, the goal, but if he stayed within reasonable range of it without hitting its neighbor, then he'd still get points.

“I was thinking 10 points for a direct hit, and 5 points for a near miss,” Deuce explained, noting yet ignoring the bemused grin with which Ace pinned him, “but you'd have to deduct 5 points every time you hit the wrong target. Or maybe 10 points, actually, to give a better incentive to—” he cut himself off in response to Ace's ever-widening grin, frowning at him. “What?”

“Nothing,” Ace chimed, taking a handful of branches from Deuce's relaxed grip, “it's just I hadn't thought of using a point system, that's all.”

The subject was dropped before Deuce would question it, feeling rather positive that Ace's reaction had been in line with thinking Deuce to be some kind of rule-loving nerd...

... Which wouldn't have been all that unfair of a deduction, honestly speaking.

Although he would have liked nothing more than to sit beside Ace and encourage him to _try again, you almost got it that time,_ and to gently guide his train of thought back to the task at hand when he started vocalizing the desire to perhaps get back out into the sea and make another attempt at fishing (a sentiment that, while agreeing with its necessity, Deuce was not all that keen on repeating in a hurry), Deuce had other matters to attend to that had absolutely nothing to do with trying to alleviate the restlessness that had anchored itself to his heart.

While Ace clicked his tongue and muttered encouragement for himself in the form of, “c'mon you big idiot, _concentrate_ ,” Deuce made himself useful by heading back into the forest yet again, feeling he was definitely becoming far too familiar with the wending pathways that the fallen trees and crops of shrubs created. Even if he couldn't contribute to the training itself, there were still things he could do.

Firstly, he set his own water bottle beside Ace's that he found at the base of the cliffs in the heart of the island. Next, while giving the area he had previously found those evil biting ants a wide berth, he began the search for anything they could use to fashion a boat big enough for two men and a propeller. Maybe even a mast for a sail, if they could find anything to act as the sail itself too.

Luck, it seemed, was really beginning to favor him. Or perhaps more fittingly, Deuce thought, luck was still flatly ignoring his presence while in fact shining her smile down onto Ace instead, and Deuce was just getting caught up in the continued benefits of befriending him. For to his amazement and initial glee, on circling back round almost to the point where he had first started this poorly advised adventure trip, he discovered one of the tall, broad palm trees had fallen, snapping almost cleanly in two near the base.

It almost didn't seem natural, that almost perfectly neat break through the trunk – something that heavy should have uprooted itself on its fall, surely, Deuce assumed – but with a shrug and an instruction of, “don't ask, don't worry,” issued to himself, Deuce set to work on detaching the tree from its base with the help of Ace's knife.

Dragging it all the way back to where Deuce trusted Ace to still be engaging with his training was going to be a chore. Though Ace had very luckily not lost the length of rope _he_ had set out with in his violent departure from his original boat, it still proved to be a challenge to move the damn thing, even when strapped up ready for moving. It was with difficulty that Deuce managed to get it moving at all, sliding noisily over the dense carpet of debris in conjunction with his grunts and occasional hissed profanities. Once again, Deuce found himself feeling exceedingly thankful for his gloves; rope burn wouldn’t be a whole load of fun out here with no antiseptic.

“What took you so long?” was how Ace greeted him back at the camp an hour later, flat on his belly in the sand, shirt yet again discarded a few feet away in a crumpled heap for reasons that remained a mystery to Deuce’s tired mind. “You’ve been gone forever – did you find—?”

But Ace’s question about suitable branches for a boat was cut short. With an almighty thud of the trunk hitting the sand, Deuce released the rope from over his shoulder and flopped down beside his prize, sweaty and winded, but really, _really_ fucking proud of himself.

“Ooh,” Ace chirped, wriggling up into a sitting position to better face his now rapidly stripping companion, watching with interest as Deuce almost tore his jacket from off his shoulders, “look at that! That's an awesome find, Deuce! Did you haul that back here all by yourself?”

“No,” Deuce gave a sarcastic, breathless snort, dragging a wrist over his forehead and feeling secretly grateful that his mask stopped the sweat from running into his eyes, “it got up and—and followed me all the way to the forest line.”

“Oh, ha ha,” Ace grinned with a pronounced roll of his eyes, “yeah, okay, my bad for the dumb question.”

Ace crawled over and away from his current target practices, some smoking, some incinerated entirely down to little sooty stubs, others still standing proud amid black stains littering the sand. From what Deuce could see through the static beginning to cloud his vision, the piles of burnt twigs and branches all around the target practice line indicated that Ace had not only stuck with it for the duration of Deuce's absence, but was also making steady progress with his aim.

“This'll be really useful,” Ace said, giving the tree a little tap with his boot, “we can cut it up into sections and whittle it down, hollow it out – good thing it's wide enough for you to sit on, that means we'll definitely have room to...” he trailed off with a frown, focus flicking from tree to Deuce. “Uh,” he said uncertainly, “are you okay?”

For Deuce was still struggling to fully catch his breath. Removing his jacket hadn’t helped much, given the heat of the sun overhead, and though the breeze rolling in off the sea was a little helpful, it couldn’t be expected to sort him out as fast as Ace seemed to expect him to recover from dragging such an enormous weight so far.

“Fine,” Deuce panted, fanning at his face, grin firmly in place, “just fine.”

“Oh, I know what'll help!”

There was nothing that _could_ help, Deuce tried to tell him as Ace hurried away far too eagerly, and he _was_ fine. All he had to do was sit quietly for a few minutes, diaphragm open and breathing deeply, and then the pretty swirly patterns obscuring his vision would fade away and he could carry on with his day. It was his fault that he had over exerted himself anyway; there had been no reason _not_ to come back and ask for Ace’s help, or to maybe not stomp through the forest as fast as he could physically coerce his legs into moving. So, no – this was on him.

Ace, Deuce learned when he came bounding back, wasn’t referring to his burning lungs and altered vision, though.

“Here you go!” He said cheerfully, slapping his folded-up shirt to Deuce’s face and gaining himself a muffled yelp of protest. “You can use this to dry off the sweat!”

“I don’t need your _shirt_ for that,” Deuce spluttered, embarrassed, snatching the shirt up, “don’t be disgusting.”

“It’s not disgusting,” Ace pouted, “it’s called being _helpful_.”

“It’s _called_ ‘this hasn’t been washed for at least a week and it stinks of seawater and sweat already,’ you mean,” Deuce countered, trying to hand the shirt back to Ace but failing, seeing as Ace had most unhelpfully taken a step away, a grin dancing in his eyes. He sighed dramatically, idly balling the shirt up in his hands. “C’mon, take it back.”

Ace paused in his twirl on his heels, hands coming to rest pointedly at the back of his head, clearly needed up there and not outstretched to receive the shirt.

“I made it to nearly two hundred points, by the way,” Ace said as if that was where the conversation had been heading, looking most pleased with himself, “with the target practice thing, y’know. Your point system was a good idea! I lost count near the beginning so had to start again, but that kinda motivated me to pay more attention.”

Deuce was on his feet and striding away at once, the static sparkles and tightness in his chest be damned. The praise was too much; too sudden; too sincere and solely concentrated entirely on _him_ , on _his_ idea, however menial and insignificant it had been. It caught him off guard, caused something not unlike panic, but prettier, more sugary-sweet, to rise in his throat and issue as a cough pressed tight into what he inconveniently had in his hands.

“Ah! Don’t cough into my shirt!” Ace protested, trotting after Deuce on his aimless fleeing towards the sea. “Now _that’s_ disgusting, Deuce, you big hypocrite! I don’t want your germs all over it!”

“How about we just toss it into the sea?” Deuce asked innocently, raising it in his fist above his head as if to pitch it like a baseball, weak to his own grin and Ace’s sudden look of abject horror both. “I mean, seeing as neither of us want it—”

“I take it back!” Ace wailed, lunging to grab for the shirt but missing. “Okay, I’m sorry, I’ll have it back if you’re gonna get all mean about it!”

“I’m not being mean,” Deuce laughed, twisting away from Ace’s frantic grabs at the aloft shirt, “I’m being logical.”

“You’re being a dick,” Ace huffed, though there was a smile on his lips and the tug of a giggle about his voice nonetheless, anger and indignation as feigned as Deuce’s suggestion. “Now gimme, before I have to wrestle it off you.”

But before Deuce could come up with a razor-sharp witty comeback – or even any type of comeback at all, brilliant or otherwise – Ace, in his barrage of hops and grabs and dancing from foot to foot in his playful attempt to snatch back his shirt, slapped a palm to Deuce’s chest.

Deuce’s chest, which was still slick with sweat, burning with exhaustion.

Ace froze.

Deuce froze – waiting, wondering, Ace’s other hand enclosed around his wrist in its climb up to the shirt in his grasp.

Ace withdrew the palm at Deuce’s chest slowly, as if his mind was working in overdrive, it seemed, eyes flicking from Deuce’s to palm and back up again, unable to fathom… whatever it was that was unfathomable to him.

And then realisation broke through in the form of brows furrowing; his mouth forming a perfectly comedic circle, before uttering a broken cry of disgust—

—and seeing fit to reach up and wipe his damp hand on Deuce’s cheek, of all things.

Something in Deuce _snapped_.

Before today, Deuce had had no idea he could carry another man around on his shoulders. Nor did he know he could drag a tree more than twice his height what felt like half the length of Sixis.

And before today – before right now, this moment, this second – Deuce certainly hadn’t known that he could bodily lift Ace, shrieks of laughter and wails of, “don’t, Deuce, don’t, oh my god I’m sorry! I’m sorry!” included, and pretend to throw him in a wide curve out into the sea—

Only to be overbalanced by Ace’s thrashing, sending them both down into the surf yet again, laughing until he cried tears of heartfelt happiness that he couldn’t even think of attempting to stem.

* * *

Training resumed once both were sufficiently dry again, heaved breaths broken only to the occasional flutter of giggles from each.

All things considered – given that pretending to attempt to (and then accidentally succeeding) launch a Devil Fruit user into the sea was, in hindsight, one of the meaner pranks he could have pulled – Deuce rather felt that the punch he received to his shoulder was well deserved, and only retaliated by waving a tired hand in Ace’s direction.

Yes – training resumed for Ace, whereas for Deuce, it suddenly became evident that there wasn’t a whole lot to be occupying himself with right now. The body of their boat was won fair and square from Sixis’ clutches; he couldn’t go fish by himself; they’d probably never run out of branches for target practice or for future bonfires, given how Deuce had collected an excessive amount in his bid to prove himself useful…

So really, if he looked at it logically and not through the lens of someone exhausted in body but not mind… Deuce felt he was perfectly justified in wanting a rest. Just for a little while, of course.

Ace, once again flat on his stomach and pointing both hands at his targets as if he were wielding guns, didn't notice Deuce struggling up onto the black rocks. Didn't notice his labored grunts, nor how his arms shook with fatigue on his short climb. Didn't notice how he cast a furtive glance over his shoulder once he was in position, still feeling quite valid in his decision to forego anything strenuous right now, yet feeling sheepishly guilty all the same. Sort of like how a child may feel when dipping their hand into the cookie jar before dinner, he mused as he flopped down onto the sun-warmed rock face, thankful he had at least thought of putting his jacket back on again to protect him from the heat.

It was with a deep, bone-shuddering groan that Deuce stretched out under the sun like a cat on a window sill, shoulder popping audibly and peace washing over him. This was it. This was the life; work hard, relax harder. He'd have to remember to call Ace up here when he took his next break, and maybe start thinking about asking him about that tattoo that kept drawing Deuce's gaze whenever Ace whipped his shirt off. The crossed-out S bothered him deeply, quite sure in himself that it had been the mistake of an incompetent tattoo artist, the question of whether Ace had ever received any compensation for such a serious fuck up one that Deuce kept finding himself musing over.

However, Deuce's short-lived and fleeting thoughts of Ace's ink were quickly dashed. The world went dark in conjunction with the sound of Ace clambering onto the rock as well, panting as he hauled himself up. Despite having his eyes closed against the blinding sun overhead, Deuce could well imagine Ace’s expression as he stood over him, casting him into shadow.

“Nope,” Ace said with an air of one not to be argued with, “ _nope_ , you are _not_ lying here sunbathing while I bust my ass training.”

“There’s nothing for me to do,” Deuce pointed out, definitely not whining, as he cracked one eye open – sure enough, Ace towered over him, dominating the view of the sky above as he beamed a shit-eating grin down at Deuce, hands on his hips. “What?” Deuce demanded, unable to keep the grin from creeping in to tug a wry smile at his lips. “I’m telling the truth; you’ve got enough branches down there to keep yourself occupied for a while. Let me rest for a bit – it wasn’t easy work, hauling that shit from the forest.”

But Ace didn’t seem at all interested in listening to Deuce’s plight. In fact, as he stepped back to stop caging Deuce’s ribs between his boots (and inadvertently blind Deuce when he stopped blocking out the sun), he flashed Deuce a grin that made the hair on the back of his neck stand on end, a thrill of nervous energy bolting through him.

“Nope,” Ace repeated, cracking his knuckles into his fist and nudging the sole of one of Deuce’s boots with his toe as if testing its give, weirdly, “I’m not having that. You’re getting up and keeping me company, if nothing else.”

“I can keep you company from up here,” Deuce protested, covering his eyes with his arm to avoid the bright sunlight and Ace’s grin both, “look, if you go back down and yell to me, I’ll yell back. That’ll be okay, right? You don’t _need_ me sitting right next to you, do you?”

“Yeah, I do,” Ace countered; when Deuce sighed pointedly, he giggled, “hey, why do _you_ get to slack off? We’re reforming you into an adventurer, aren’t we? So get off your ass and work, Mr. Pampered Rich Boy.”

“I dragged a whole tree down here!” Deuce snapped, feigning indignant hurt. When Ace just gave a vague grunt in response, Deuce changed tactics with a dramatic sigh. “And chatting to you isn’t _working_ ,” he whined, voice muffled by his arm covering his more than obvious grin, “go have a conversation with yourself or something, you’ll find you’re amazing company.”

Ah, he had complimented Ace straight to his face again, dammit.

Ace, luckily, didn't seem to pick up on it. He clicked his tongue, snorting a laugh. “Nah,” he said, “I had enough of that before you showed yourself.” He cracked the knuckles of his other hand loudly, earning a quick glance from under Deuce’s crooked elbow. “Guess there’s nothing else I can do,” he sighed in mock disappointment, casting a look over Deuce that had him swallowing thickly with an excited flutter of nerves. “C’mon, up you get.”

And then he squatted down and, before Deuce could ask what he planned on doing, Ace had grabbed him by the ankles and _pulled_.

With an indecently ugly yelp that morphed into a reluctant laugh _,_ Deuce flailed in Ace's hold.

“Okay! Fine!” He wailed, struggling, cheeks lighting up blazing red, he was certain, under Ace's snickers and snorts of laughter, “alright, I'll get up, you've made your point, you've— let _go_ — _”_

“Nap time's not 'til later, my dude,” Ace chided, adopting the air of a teacher most displeased with his student, “I need my cheerleader by my side and singing my praises until I get to five hundred points—”

Gloved palms slapped to Deuce's mask to meet his groan of a sigh, shaken to his core too suddenly, too completely, by Ace's insistence that he was _needed_ —

“So up, up, up!” Ace trilled, giving his ankles an almighty tug—

—that resulted in Deuce's left boot sliding clean off his foot, and Ace flailing in a spectacular imitation of a windmill for one horrifying moment before he was able to right himself.

The boot soared through the air in a high arc, and, as Deuce watched in utter dismay through fingers held tight to his face, it landed with a miserable little _splat_ in the sea.

Because of course it did.

It was becoming something of a recurring theme, this whole _ending up in the sea_ business, Deuce thought with an exasperated sigh that whistled between his palms.

“Oops,” Ace stated, not sounding at all fazed by the quickly sinking boot. Next second, he was bracing to hop off the rock directly into the shallows, much to Deuce's horror. “No worries! I'll get it back before you can say—”

But what that might be, Deuce never found out. With adrenaline beating through his veins and a mantra of _how poor is your memory Ace oh my god shitshitshit_ thrumming through his mind, Deuce lunged forward to grab at Ace's belt and drag him back from certain death.

By the time he had gone back into the sea and fished out his poor boot, Deuce was quite certain that remaining with Ace would mean a life spent torn equally between incredulous exasperation, heart-stopping terror, and laughter that came free and naturally in all that he did.

* * *

Several days passed in this same oddly comforting fashion, each bringing with it a gradually building sense that this, here, experiencing all through the scope of life whiled away by Ace's side, was what he had unknowingly spent the last 18 years impatiently waiting for—

Waking up every day with Ace plastered against him, always with the insistence that the fire had died in the night and Deuce had been shivering.

Fishing in the early morning, Ace's thighs gripping his cheeks, the humiliation lessening just that little bit more each day to the point where Deuce didn't even flush magenta anymore.

Training. Training. Training again and again and again until Ace could command explicit and absolute control over his fire, his power. Now, six days deep into continuous effort and following many a snarled hiss of irritation at himself, Ace didn't miss. At all. Furthermore, his dexterity over his flames grew and evolved to the point where control was as fluid as that of his own limbs. With minimal effort – with as much conscious thought put into it as one might think of raising a hand – Ace's flames ranged from a tickling flicker all the way up into a blazing inferno.

(The first time Ace had attempted his gigantic fireball, Deuce had watched in rapt awe as the miniature sun wielded over Ace's head had expanded. The bigger it had swelled, the more magnificent Ace appeared underneath it, all radiant confidence coupled with an unshakable brilliance that was so uniquely _his_.)

(Not that Deuce had then once again been visited by the burning desire to splash his notebook pages with reams upon reams of Ace's visage in that moment.)

But aside from finding himself not only energized by being in the constant company of another person for the first time in his life, but also _enjoying_ each second that passed engulfed in Ace's warmth, there was one other aspect of island life on Sixis that Deuce found himself to thoroughly and sincerely enjoy:

 _Learning_.

Which, on thinking about it during their dinner of fish and potatoes on the fifth night, Deuce guessed really was just another angle of reveling in life with Ace.

For Ace held true to his promise to impart his vast amounts of survival knowledge onto Deuce, his unlikely student and veritable blank slate. A patient and encouraging teacher, Ace showed Deuce not only how to properly descale and skin several of the variations of fish they caught together, but also how to locate, dig for, collect, and filter fresh water, reducing the need to wait for it to collect in their bottles at the base of the cliffs. Now that Ace's fire was in the picture, things that had been impossible beforehand became relatively easy, and Deuce was able to learn and understand more than anything he had ever been forced to remember and recite back in university.

Like making their boat, for example. Through a combination of whittling and burning, by the end of the sixth day together they managed to fashion a decently sized craft, complete with an internal propeller in the stern. Once Ace's control of his fire was sufficiently to his desired standard, he hummed tunelessly to himself as he burned the surface of the wood, carbonizing it like Deuce had suggested back when making the fishing spears. The only downside that came with carbonizing was the fact that they both ended up susceptible to getting smudges of soot smeared everywhere; a fate that was made worse when Ace slapped a blackened palm to Deuce's chest, eyes twinkling with the invitation to play-fight.

Following much slapping, plenty of shrieks and screams of laughter from both, and more soot covering their skin and clothes than was left adorning the little boat, surely, Deuce called off the attack with one last handprint smudging dark to Ace's shin. The bonfire cast great shadows up the beach from their camp, throwing the forest behind them into total darkness – and all that filled Deuce's vision was Ace.

Brilliantly, vibrantly, _Ace_.

And that, Deuce happily realised, was all he ever wanted to fill his thoughts, his sight, his mind as a whole from this moment onward.

Whether Ace intended for them to remain together post-Sixis didn't matter; this time, Deuce was going to be wildly, nauseatingly selfish.

His mind made up, his heart full to bursting with nerves for their planned departure tomorrow and love of the moment today, Deuce gave their boat a pat, turning Ace's sunny smile from him to it.

“I've decided to call it the Striker,” Deuce announced, definitely not deflating a little with the self-imposed loss of Ace's attention onto himself. “What do you think?”

“The Striker, huh?” Ace murmured, distractedly rubbing at a sooty handprint halfway up his arm. “Very... striking.” Deuce's withering look was enough to prompt Ace into a snort, adding, “you're still confident this'll get us past those currents?”

Deuce followed his gaze out to the deceitfully placid sea, watching the waves lap the shore for a heartbeat before sealing their fate. “Yes,” he said firmly, “I'm sure you can do it.”

It hadn't been a question of Deuce's faith in Ace's abilities – not really – but Ace didn't look inclined to argue the point he had been leaning into.

“In that case, why don't we celebrate before we go?” He asked excitedly, rounding back on Deuce, eyes ablaze with that same delight that had preceded the soot fight. “Let's eat all our food, stuff ourselves stupid, and have a party!”

“That's for the trip tomorrow, so no, we can't,” Deuce calmly pointed out, sparing half a glance back at Ace's bulging bag all ready for whatever they may face out at sea. Everything that he owned had been relocated into Deuce's bag, making as much room as possible for as much as he could physically carry. Though Deuce had found it funny, Ace hadn't appreciated the joke about Deuce robbing him blind the moment they weighed anchor.

“Ugh, fine,” Ace sighed as Deuce leaned over to pluck up two of Ace's filled bottles, “I still say you're being overly cautious, though.”

Ignoring this entirely, choosing only to offer Ace a smile and bottle both, Deuce said, “we'll have to make do with these for today, unfortunately.”

“And then celebrate _properly_ with heaps of food and beer at the first tavern we find?” Ace asked hopefully, taking the proffered bottle.

Caught by the implication – hope rising within him so abruptly that his breath stuck fast in his suddenly constricted throat – Deuce nodded feverishly, knocking his bottle to Ace's in a toast.

In a promise.

* * *

“Deuce?”

“Yes, Ace?”

“Would you... would you read Brag Men to me now?”

“Now?”

“To fall asleep to. Seeing as it’s our last night, and all.”

Deuce smiled, dipping his chin to his chest lest Ace look over and catch him _feeling_.

Lest he say something stupid, the likes of which should only exist penned into his notebook and left there to blot lines across his heart.

“I'll read Brag Men to you forever,” he breathed, standing up to go fetch it and his notebook from his bag.

_Until my last breath; until I am gone; I shall read Brag Men to you, my number one._

* * *

The urge to write overpowered any sensible thoughts that would have normally accompanied Deuce to sleep that night. After assuming their positions now as learned as a native language woven into their bodies – after Ace fell asleep facing him, close, comforting, _real_ – Deuce decided to take his first step only ten days overdue its start date.

Now was as good a chance as any – now that Ace was soundly asleep, producing a whole symphony of snuffled noises into the fist drawn tight against his mouth, Deuce could set to work on what he had truly come here to do.

Holding his notebook again, letting it fall open to the first blank page, expensive silver pen rolling into the center to nestle between the cream sheets, felt intrinsically _right_. Like he was returning to his roots, getting back to basics, of who he was as a person. Not a doctor – not a medic or otherwise someone learned in the art of the human body – no, that was, after all, an occupation forced upon him where passion ran dry for such a subject. This here, his book in his hand, his mind teeming with thoughts of sentence structures and colloquialisms and metaphors… _this_ was his real self finally able to take its stand.

“And it’s all thanks to you,” Deuce whispered to Ace, the words lost under a grunt and Ace shifting in his sleep.

If Ace hadn’t have saved him in both body and mind – bringing him back from the brink of death both physically and psychologically – then Deuce would have never opened this book. He would have never taken up his pen, smiled to himself to learn it still worked even after its stint in the ocean, and put ink to paper to create the beginnings of his journey. There would have _been_ no journey to tell, had he never felt Ace’s kindness take him back to himself and away from the sorrow.

But where should he start? How did one start a story like this? The pen hovered over the paper, waiting for its master to make up his mind. What Deuce wanted to do was open with a thank you to Ace; a great big sappy monologue detailing exactly how he felt, how grateful he was, and how much he valued the freckled man snoring gently beside him on the sand. He would have liked to introduce the story by expressing how warm he felt right in that second, body heated by the merrily crackling fire at his feet, heart melted by the care of another.

Was this what attachment was supposed to feel like? Was this what he had been looking for his whole life, drawing up short each time in the face of snapped anger and berating bile? Deuce rather thought that, in that moment, he was little more than a baby duckling imprinting on its new mother figure, cheeping feebly for its chosen one to nurture and love.

And that was how the inside of the notebook came to acquire a dreadful doodle of what was unmistakably a duck with a cowboy hat and freckles littering its face.

“It’s curious, isn’t it,” Deuce said quietly to Ace’s sleeping form, “how success can disguise itself as failure. Maybe we shouldn’t be so quick to write off our whole lives when things don’t go to plan.”

Words he had never believed in when teachers had tried to console and encourage. Words that he had sneered at for being unfoundedly optimistic, along with that damned phrase _everything happens for a reason_.

Deuce couldn’t believe that he was now agreeing with such a line.

And yet here he was, sitting next to living proof that yes, maybe things _did_ happen for a reason.

Ace’s cheek was warm to the backs of Deuce’s fingers, even through the glove.

* * *

The dawn of their seventh and final day on Sixis broke bright and crisp as all before it, the sun throwing the sea into a myriad of sparkling diamonds. What night chill lingered over the east-facing beach was dispelled in a gentle wave of warmth, bathing the only two occupants of the most beautiful island in the whole of East Blue.

And this time – for the first time in his eleven days stranded at Sixis' mercy, begging for her pardon and living off her parched land – Deuce was awake to witness the sun break over the horizon.

Awake to let the unexpected melancholy fill him along with the sun's quietly reassuring touch to salt-dried skin.

There, lying in the sand beside their burnt out bonfire, pillowing Ace wrapped around him for the seventh day in a row, Deuce was inexplicably struck by how saddened he felt to think that this would be their final morning greeting in that stunning view.

For all its drawbacks - for all the trauma that would surely leave the island with him as an unwelcome stowaway in the back of his mind - Sixis had become something undeniably special to Deuce. Here, he knew - had penned into his notebook by firelight and Ace's snores combined - was where he had found himself. Truly discovered what it meant to be free; to experience what he had spent a lifetime missing out on... and what he now had a second chance to revel in for the rest of his days.

Yes, a second chance. Rebirth through flames and soot and ash. Gone was his old life, his old name, his old roles to fill and parents to fail...

... and here was a new identity. A new purpose. His real and sole reason to rise with the sun and welcome the day with vigor.

Ace shifted against him, tightening his grip around his chest with an incomprehensible mumble. Though he still couldn't convince himself that he was entirely comfortable with this - with the intimacy that cuddling brought, if only for lack of exposure to this brand of care throughout his life, and thus not knowing how to deal with the emotions it gave rise to - Deuce also couldn't deny that there was something _nice_ about it all. How Ace did it to take care of him in his own way, using his powers to ward off the chill that did so enjoy afflicting Deuce in the night.

His gaze drifted to the pile of firewood they hadn't used up, then flickered back to the mop of black hair under his chin.

_Hm._

He wasn't entirely sure he wanted to fixate on the implications that arose just yet.

Instead, after gently detaching himself from Ace's ridiculously strong grip binding them together, Deuce yawned, stretched, and, after tracing the words _back later_ into the sand for Ace to see, turned back to the forest for his last foray into its depths.

Fifteen minutes into trudging aimlessly through thick foliage and fallen branches, it occurred to Deuce that perhaps his wandering wasn't as random as he had first thought it to be. Caught up in that peculiar sense of wistful melancholy that had gripped him since waking, Deuce's feet had apparently unconsciously taken him back in the direction of where he had first sat down under a fruitless palm tree, ready to die.

Ready to watch the sun set over Sixis, side by side with the skeleton that had spoken through dehydrated hallucinations and the damning urgency for company both, for one final time.

The place where his final chapter was supposed to close firm, but had instead been torn open, his last page stuck into a new, fresh, blank book ready for filling with stories upon tales upon records of _Ace, Ace, Ace_.

The breeze lifted his hair about his face on his arrival beside the haphazardly crafted grave overlooking the jewel-bright sea.

The sand crunched beneath his boots as he crouched down, dropping heavily into a cross-legged sit beside his long-dead companion beneath the earth.

The place where _he_ had ended.

The place where _Deuce_ had began.

Now that he was here, Deuce felt he should say something, maybe. Perhaps reel off a great long monologue, narrated to the sea and the dead pirate together as one, detailing his thanks, his hopes, his peace found in the disconnect he felt with who he had been and where he had come from.

But the words wouldn't come. With each beat of his heart that passed; with every tiny sensation that accompanied the twitch of his fingers in the sand, the caress of his hair to his cheeks, his neck... Deuce found the desire to vocalize any of that slipping away, fading into the air, receding into mere memory.

Instead, many minutes later - following many deep breaths into his gloves, thumbing away the tears that built and broke over his cheeks - Deuce laid a hand to the pitiful headstone he had set down a lifetime ago.

He took a deep breath, filling himself with it, and sighed:

_“Thank you.”_

* * *

Ace was awake by the time he made it back to camp, a twig sticking out from between his teeth, bonfire slightly smoking with a pile of food on a cut palm leaf beside it. On noticing Deuce returning, Ace spat out the twig with a bright grin and snatched up what was obviously waiting to become Deuce's breakfast.

“There you are!” He beamed, handing the leafy platter of potatoes and newly-discovered mushrooms to Deuce. “I was starting to think you'd got lost or something! You okay?”

Not quite able to meet his inquiring look, Deuce nodded at his food instead, gratefully taking it. “Yeah, all good,” he said perhaps a little too heartily, eagerly getting started on one particularly large orange potato, “I just needed some time alone - nothing to worry about.”

Ace nodded gravely, frowning. “I getcha,” he said seriously, surprising Deuce enough to raise his gaze questioningly, “I don't blame you wanting some privacy if you got the shits.”

Ace's squeal of pain on Deuce's boot connecting with his hip sent several of the seagulls in the palm trees lining the beach into panicked flight.

“ _Must_ you be disgusting?” Deuce snapped as Ace laughed his apologies. “I was _thinking_ , nothing more.”

“Thinking about what?” Ace asked, massaging his hip - for a man now made of fire, it sure was curiously easy to inflict injury to him, Deuce thought absently, eyeing up the red mark above the line of his shorts. When Deuce didn't respond immediately, pointedly avoiding the question by shoveling more food into his mouth until his cheeks were hurting, Ace pressed him again, stepping in closer with a concerned little frown to replace the raucous laughter. “Deuce? Thinking about what?”

It was supposed to be a difficult thing, baring one's soul, their innermost thoughts and feelings, Deuce knew. It was supposed to be something that people struggled with, whether it be to partners, to therapists, to family who loved and family who didn't.

But when faced with what the consequences of remaining silent might be - when Deuce looked up into Ace's kind gray eyes and saw only his future waiting there - suddenly the anxiety surrounding honesty fell away, piece by piece. His mind was made up, and really, at this point, what did he have to lose? What could he possibly lose by telling Ace what had chased him from the moment he had shared his food with him, given him his second chance, given him ambition and a solid goal to follow after rather than a vapor of a dream?

What was there to lose... other than Ace himself?

Silence would ensure that. Selflessness - the desire to stand aside, to let his opportunity pass him on by - would result in the death of the man that Ace had breathed life into, surely.

So it was now or never.

Deuce only hesitated long enough to lay his breakfast down on the black rocks behind himself, fully incapable of breaking eye contact with Ace.

“I was thinking about you,” he said clearly, calmly, resolute, “and about us. About where we go from now.”

Ace didn't say a word, the gravity of Deuce's meaning sinking in to pull his brows into a frown.

And Deuce, perfectly aware of how this vague statement could so easily be misread and warped into something he categorically didn't mean, carried resolutely on.

“I left home to become an adventurer,” Deuce started again, willing himself calm, forcing his voice not to shake, “and to leave behind what my father had forced upon me since my birth. I had no intention of ever trusting anyone ever again; I swore, on taking my boat out to sea, that I would achieve my dreams alone, without help, and without the chance of being betrayed and hurt.”

He paused; Ace nodded encouragingly.

“But that was before I met you,” he continued, “before I knew that there was anyone in the world who could be as genuinely generous and selfless as you are. You tried to befriend a half-mad stranger who gave you the cold shoulder and snide words. You fed the man who intended to kill you. You—” he faltered, swallowed, grit his teeth— “you've proven again and again that I was wrong about the world and everything I believed to be true. It's _fun_ , being with you; I've never had _fun_ before. I've never had a proper friendship before... and I thought I never would. I thought I could continue to live like that, alone and empty, nameless, faceless, protected from all of the hate and misery that comes with being around people...”

He balled his fists, deliberating over his next words for a moment under Ace's intense stare.

“I've always felt alone, even when surrounded by people. In fact, it was less lonely to be by myself, away from them all; the moment I was with anyone, that's when the loneliness set it. But with you, I feel—” he gasped a little, disbelieving laugh, running gloved fingers through his hair, “well, that's just it: I _feel._ You make me _feel_ ; you, just by being _you_ , make me feel how I imagine every other person must do around others. I'm not afraid to be with you; I _care_ , and its really fucking weird for me, but because of it, I can't imagine saying goodbye to you once we find our next island. I can't do it. I can't leave you.”

Silence struck hard, pressing on them on closing his little speech. Ah, he really had just said all of that, hadn't he? Every thought that had come ill-defined and rough-hewn to him through the days really had just come spilling unfiltered out of him.

He wouldn't have blamed Ace if he had dismissed it all, embarrassed or maybe even offended by such blatant words, convinced that Deuce was mocking him because _no one_ in their right mind would make a declaration like that, surely. He'd gone too far, Deuce realised when Ace dropped his gaze to around Deuce's knees instead, frowning hard... but he didn't regret saying it. Despite how his hands shook by his sides; how his throat felt constricted and mouth dry - Deuce couldn't honestly say he regretted being as open as he had been.

“That's really kind of you, Deuce,” Ace said at length, voice quiet, reminiscent of how he had dropped from excitable and happy down to angry and brash once the topic of Roger had been raised all those days ago. A topic they had not revisited - a topic that Deuce, honestly, could not say in any honesty factored into his resolution to remain with Ace. “I kinda got the feeling that you wanted to stay together, but I didn't wanna assume, y'know?”

Deuce nodded, waiting, hoping.

“It's just,” Ace sighed, scratching at the back of his neck distractedly, “look, I'd be lying if I said I wanted to ditch you and carry on alone, okay? I think we're really good together, and I don’t wanna...” He looked uncomfortable for a moment before restarting. “Have you thought this through properly? What it'll mean for you? I'm a pirate; I'm going to go on to make a crew, and surpass Roger's fame and title. You didn't set out looking for that kind of life.”

“Maybe not, but please, take me away from everything I thought I wanted,” Deuce urged, finding his voice, slapping a hand to his heart. “Show me the life of a pirate; show me true freedom at your side.”

Ace gave him a wry, uncertain smile, yet he took a step closer, dark eyes intense. “It’ll be dangerous,” he said calmly, watching for Deuce’s reaction, “and you’ll be a wanted man once we become established. People back home might come to recognise you in the wanted posters, despite your mask and new name. We’ll be on the run; we’ll have to steal, cheat, live outside the law… You’ll be required to fight or use violence, too.” He paused, giving Deuce the chance to back out or to express hesitation, but neither came. “Is that the kind of freedom you’re looking for? Can you fill your book with tales of adventures that way?”

There was no hesitation. There was no room for doubt, for thought, for worry outside of imagining what it would mean to part ways with Ace once they hit the first town they came across. A life without the sun – a life without that heat that had sparked in his heart, shown him what it meant to become who he was supposed to be. To walk away from Ace – to willingly turn his back on his newfound reason for living – was impossible.

Let him go?

Never.

No matter what came for them or what he had to do to remain at his side, Deuce would take it in his stride. He would give him his trust, his passion, his very soul; Ace could have every part of him for the rest of their time without question. It sounded downright selfish on thinking about it, but Deuce couldn’t begin to spare any feelings for those left at home in the face of a life with Ace. He would take the risk of being identified; he would, if it ever came to it, deny outright that he had any association with his hometown to protect them. But live without Ace for the sake of their preservation?

Unthinkable.

“I’m not leaving you,” Deuce declared, free of that usual anxiety that typically accompanied such heartfelt words. “I left looking for freedom, and I found it right here in you.” Ace, most surprisingly, seemed to color under his freckles before he tipped the brim of his hat, hiding his eyes – but that didn’t deter Deuce. He was finally saying what he had kept to himself, what had built in his heart since the moment Ace had so selflessly cared for him, the undeserving pathetic idiot that he was. “You deserve better than me,” Deuce stated, balling his fists, “better than some fool who knows nothing of the world, or of what it means to be a pirate – but I swear on my life I will become worthy of you, if you’ll allow me to call you my captain.”

And if Ace _didn’t_ allow it, then too bad – Deuce would follow him regardless, become his eternal shadow. For what did a pirate care of following rules, the wishes of others? The thought alone made him feel like laughing at how easily his entire mindset had been changed by Ace, and how he was at peace with this.

“Are you prepared for the consequences?” Ace challenged, finding his voice hidden under his hat, face entirely covered by the brim and his arm. “Have you _really_ thought this through? This isn’t the adventure you set out to find; it’ll be a whole lot different to what you’ve grown up dreaming of. I don’t know if I can be a part of stopping a man from realising his lifelong goal, Deuce.”

“My dream remains the same,” Deuce said quickly, earnestly, “but my means of achieving it have been redefined. One should always be open to re-evaluating one’s beliefs when presented with new information.” God, of all the times for his father’s words to come back to him and actually be _right_.

When Ace raised his face, it was to show a grimace that pulled at Deuce’s heart in ways that almost _hurt_. That wasn’t the expression of a man ready to accept what was being proposed; that wasn’t the eager bolt of adrenaline that had settled into Deuce’s skin, prompting his fists to tremble.

There was something that Ace needed to say, yet he seemed to struggle to put it into words for a moment. With a pained frown he dropped his gaze again, refusing to look back at Deuce even when he stepped in closer.

“You are worth following,” Deuce murmured, wishing that Ace would look up again, to witness the conviction that rested heavy and honest in his eyes. “I know what you consider to be the very worst of you, and I still believe this.”

Ace flinched, a rare and unusual sign of discomfort in a world where hugs, touches, fingers to palms and backs of heads to crotches were of no consequence… and Deuce, for the first time in his life, was overcome by the desire to take hold of another’s hand. Instead, dismissing this, he laid his palm to his heart again, noting how Ace’s eyes tracked his movement, imparting his sincerity, giving Ace the piece of himself he had never thought capable of sharing with another.

“I will follow you no matter what, Ace. I can’t—”

He faltered, looking to the sand momentarily – and when he looked back up, Ace’s gray gaze was all that filled his vision.

He had everything he could ever want standing before him, a breath away, a touch separating them across a rift of self-doubt.

Everything there, right at his fingertips, if he raised them.

If he were brave enough to take hold.

Instead, he swallowed, flickering between Ace’s eyes, chasing his worries to stamp them down, to silence what haunted Ace into denying what he, too, undoubtedly wanted to be a part of.

No words had ever come more easily to him in living memory.

“I can’t imagine living as Deuce without Ace.”

* * *

He almost didn’t want to leave as the Striker shot clear over the currents surrounding Sixis. That strange longing sensation was back again, pulling at the pit of his stomach, the depths of his heart, as he glanced over his shoulder and peered around Ace’s legs at the rapidly shrinking island. Like this, framed under the sun and surrounded by the glittering sea, it truly did live up to its reputation as the most fantastically beautiful island in the East Blue.

They had arrived at Sixis lost and bereft, angry with the world and doomed to die alone and scared. Together they left, more complete and stronger bound to one another in good faith and compassion and care.

Together – following Ace’s embarrassed little snort of laughter pressed into his palm on Deuce’s final line of his grand speech – they coasted along the waves as the beginnings of the Spade pirates, a name suggested by Deuce and one gleefully agreed upon by Ace.

The sky was crystal clear, bluer than blue, shining endless and vast in invitation for the two new rookie pirates to explore under its immense embrace.

They couldn’t do any of this alone. That wasn’t the meaning to life, Deuce now knew – and Ace, too, holding down his hat to his head against the breeze, acknowledged this. Looking up at him there, framed against the cloudless sky, Deuce barely heard a word of Ace’s about fighting strong opponents to take himself up to the top of the world.

“It’s a shame there wasn’t any treasure on this island after all,” Deuce sighed, hair clouding about his face in the gentle breeze when Ace slowed down a little some moments later, just catching the end of his mention about treasure and clinging to it for something sensible to say.

Ace hummed nonchalantly, sounding like he disagreed. “Well, I dunno about that,” he said thoughtfully, cocking his head as he looked down at Deuce, those dark eyes swimming with something undefinable, “I mean, _you’re_ coming with me, aren’t you?”

It took Deuce a moment to process Ace’s real meaning – took him longer than it should have to parse what Ace was implying as Deuce stared up at him, thinking not for the first time that Ace looked dazzling when silhouetted against the brilliant blue sky. But when it clicked, and when Deuce grinned broadly with his heart feeling like it had swollen to three times its normal size, he found himself agreeing completely.

Not all treasure in life was gold and silver, jewels and riches.

Deuce took the hand extended to him, shaking it firmly in their silent pact.

Life had decided his course for him. Life, once thought to be challenging and hateful, a mere product of spite callously keeping him alive against his will, had steered him toward Ace, despite the odds.

Meeting Ace was fate – there were no two ways about it. A week ago, Deuce had sneered at the thought of something as conveniently whimsical as _fate_ , as something beyond humanity’s control pulling their puppet strings to make them dance accordingly.

But now he understood. Everything in his life had been leading up to the moment he would look up into the face of a veritable angel and label him a hallucination. His birth; his death; it had all happened so that one day, he would be here to be found by Ace.

_I’ll live for him, survive for him, and one day, die for him, too. A life lived with no regrets._

_To have met someone who could inspire such thoughts and feelings in a man like me… Well, that really does make me the luckiest guy in the world._

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Feel free to fill [my Tumblr](https://chromiwrites.tumblr.com/) inbox with prompts, nonsense, or anything at all! I love to chat TT
> 
> Comments and kudos let me know if I'm doing something right, and I always love your feedback!


	5. Tamarcela: Part I

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I'm so sorry for the long wait! And I'm equally so sorry for the incredibly huge word count! 22k for a chapter!! What am I doing!! This chapter is quite silly and doesn't take itself seriously. Ace and Deuce are Fools and we love them ♥
> 
> This begins the first of two chapters about Ace and Deuce's time on Tamarcela, a tiny fishing island that neighbors Sixis. Tamarcela is based on Nueva Tabarca, a real islet off the Spanish Valencian coast. 
> 
> I'd like to take this chance to apologize for the lack of One Piece-like content, in that there are no fights, no marines, no shounen gusto in this chapter. There will be plenty of time for that later on; these two are hot off the heels of Survival Mode, so give them a chance, ok? ;)
> 
> The music I imagine to be playing through Tamarcela (and what I listened to throughout writing this) is similar to [this track](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xaVvNERzNXA) from Grandia II ♥

“Land ho!”

Ace's announcement cut through the haze of fatigue that had settled like fog over Deuce's mind, dispelling it with those two simple words. Opening his eyes against the relentless breeze, a thrill of adrenaline shot through him at the sight of the land breaking across the horizon, the promise of solid earth beneath his feet one that was very gladly welcomed.

It had only been around six hours since leaving Sixis (the repetition of _six_ being something that Deuce privately found amusing), but they had been six hours of gut-churning nerves and clinging to whatever he could grasp as hard as he could. Though Ace may have mastered the task of generating energy to power them forward, that didn't mean to say that the trip across the water's surface was in any way calm or enjoyable for an extended period of time.

Assuming that Ace experienced the same sensations as he did, every lurch of the Striker, every bump along the rolling waves, were enough to soon have Deuce feeling nauseous from his precarious seat on the prow... hence his decision to relocate back to the stern where he had started, wrapping himself around the mast like an overly affectionate octopus and clinging onto the contents of his stomach for dear life. At least Ace had found it amusing when Deuce had tried to shuffle past him when his flames were momentarily quelled, resulting in the Striker gently tipping with the shift in weight distribution and Deuce screaming shrilly, snatching handfuls of Ace's shirt to right himself.

Sixis already felt so long ago, yet also still present within him, somewhat unsurprisingly. Deuce had to wonder if Sixis would ever truly let him go, or whether he would carry a part of it somewhere inside of him for the rest of his life as an unseen talisman.

“That didn't take too long,” Deuce said gratefully, unsticking his cheek from where it had been pressed to the mast and peering around Ace's legs for a better look.

Though vague, Deuce was quite sure he could just about remember that Sixis’ neighboring islands were a way off, and definitely not reachable within six hours in a normal boat. The Striker’s speed was incredible, surpassing any expectations Deuce had had for it, for which he was deeply thankful – the possibility of having to spend the night out in the open on the little craft had not been something he had been looking forward to tackling.

“Which island is it, anyway? Where are we?” Deuce asked, squinting at the steadily growing strip of land.

Something they should have discussed before heading out, yet had neglected to do in light of the jumpy nerves and embarrassed grins that had come with Deuce's heartfelt declaration to follow Ace for the rest of his life. Neither had thought to bring up the topic of their heading, both scrabbling hurriedly onto the Striker and flying over the waves towards the hazy horizon, keen to be truly free at last.

They were so inexperienced it was almost laughable. Deuce could only hope that Ace had memorized his old map of the surrounding seas and islands that Sixis neighbored, because Deuce sure couldn't remember those details, minus the general distance, so long after losing his own map to the perilous current.

“Dunno!” Ace brightly exclaimed, turning just in time to catch the worried look on Deuce's face. “It's okay though, 'cause we've made it!”

“You set off without knowing what was ahead?” Deuce confirmed, seeing the answer twinkling mischievously in Ace's gray eyes. “What if we’d gone off in the wrong direction, and there'd been nothing for days on end?”

Ace pondered this, pursing his lips. Then, with a grin splitting his freckled face again, he said, “then your decision to hoard all that food would have really paid off, huh?” Then, as a thoughtful aside, “we really could have done with a log pose, couldn’t we?”

“No, not yet,” Deuce said distractedly, “I’ve never heard of anyone navigating East Blue with a log pose… a map would normally suffice…”

“Huh, is that right?”

What bothered Deuce most wasn't that Ace had been rash and careless; it was that he himself was just as much to blame for potentially making their first stride into life as a pirate crew a disastrous one. Deuce swallowed, patting around for the bag with the water bottles in, not trusting himself to look down and upset his equilibrium. He would learn from this mistake, and he would make sure Ace did, too.

A thought then occurred to him. Addressing the back of Ace's fluttering shirt, Deuce shouted over the roar of the wind, “if you're the captain of the Spade pirates, what would that make me?” He paused, meeting Ace's eye peaking at him over his shoulder as he worked open the water bottle, then suggested, “scribe? Record keeper?”

Deuce didn't think he could withstand Ace saying he would be the doctor of the crew. A first-year dropout was not qualified to be called _doctor_ in any capacity, and Deuce did not want to play that role anymore. Unsuited and unqualified, he would correct Ace with no hesitation should he suggest it, even if he couldn’t imagine what skillset he could possibly bring to a pirate crew. Maybe his role could be reading Ace a bedtime story and being used as a living body pillow for him to wrap around, drool and all.

“What? No,” Ace snorted, hair whipping about his face, “we don’t need a dedicated record keeper; you can do that on the side if you want to. You'll be my first mate!”

Deuce fought against the smile that tried to bloom, noting the ring of pride in Ace's voice... although he wasn't entirely sure why, exactly.

“And what does a first mate do?” He was, after all, still painfully ignorant to the structure of pirate crews, their ways, conduct, and all that came with being on the inside rather than a vague spectator of something he had previously had no desire to understand.

Ace shrugged. “First mate-y things.”

Deuce frowned at him. “Which would include...?”

Ace glanced forward to the horizon before looking back at him over his shoulder. “You'll be second in command,” he explained, and Deuce was thankful that he didn't sound patronizing, “so you'll be like me, but not me, because _I’m_ me.”

Deuce waited for more to come, but Ace offered nothing else, the corner of his smile just visible over the curve of his shoulder.

“Right. Well, thank you for that stellar explanation,” Deuce said sarcastically when it became abundantly obvious that Ace wasn't going to expand on that sentence, “that makes things much clearer to me. Guess I should change my name to _Ace_ after all, if my role includes essentially _being you_.”

A clear, bright laugh spiraled up from Ace into the cloudless sky, captivating and warming. “I don't mean it like that!” He giggled, waving a dismissive hand in Deuce's direction. “I mean like, you'll do captain-y things in my place if I'm not around for some reason, and you'll be my go-to when making all important decisions and whatever else. You're gonna be the force that grounds me and keeps me in check.” Oh. Deuce liked the sound of that. He even felt the still-unfamiliar beginnings of pride starting to swell in his chest, liking the sincerity in Ace's tone. “Every captain needs a first mate they can rely on for anything,” Ace carried on, seeming not to notice the hesitant smile making itself known on Deuce's lips, “and that's your job. You think you're up to the task?”

Ace's gaze was intense again as Deuce looked up, studying what he could see of his face. “I'll give it a go,” he said in a would-be casual manner, as if trust and reliance were things so readily handed over to him in his previous life and this was barely worth his delight, “but you're not allowed to change your mind later when someone more suitable joins us.”

His own words, though they shouldn't have, startled him somewhat, acknowledging that yes, at some point in the future, they would inevitably gain more members in their crew. For some reason, that realization made Deuce feel somewhat jealous – lonely, even – of people he didn't know and people who could never bear responsibility for inciting such a feeling in him. But he determinedly forced those difficult emotions down under the weight of his happiness found in Ace's grin, reflecting it back at him.

“You'll be fine,” Ace confidently assured, bending to extend a hand to him. “I trust you. I wouldn’t want anyone else doing it other than you, anyway. Here, look, we'll shake on it – I promise no one's ever gonna replace you.”

 _Give a man your trust, and you give a man your Self_. Another quote from Brag Men, penned when the author had been betrayed by someone he had believed to be a devoted friend. Differences in circumstances aside, the line came back to Deuce now as he looked up at Ace, backlit by the clear blue sky and spanning the entirety of Deuce’s vision.

Before Deuce could take his hand, however, the Striker lurched with the roll of a particularly large wave, upsetting Ace's balance and tipping them sideways just enough to startle all of the seagulls hovering in the sky with their combined yells of panic.

* * *

The island, once they pulled up close enough to make out the individual white houses lining the elevated rocky coast, appeared to be a tiny fishing island. Fishing boats of all varieties – from tiny two-man crafts all the way up to bigger, more powerful trawlers – clustered in and around the little harbor; further out into the bay, Deuce spotted several going about their daily business, too. Though it was hard to make out the details from this distance, he could just about distinguish the suntanned people on the closest of the boats, hauling up an enormous net filled with flashes of wriggling silver fish.

The question of whether they would be allowed to dock in port worried Deuce for a moment, but Ace seemed confident enough as he guided the Striker between the colorful array of boats. Perhaps, Deuce wondered, pirates didn't need to worry about trivial things like docking passes or mooring licenses.

They stuck out in a striking manner, the roughly hewn Striker a unique and attention-grabbing design among the uniformity of the fishing boats. There was a certain charm to them, though, Deuce couldn't help but appreciate as they alighted onto the deserted pier, Ace stepping off first and then twirling on the spot to hold out a helping hand for Deuce, who took it after only a moment's brief hesitation.

Each fishing boat had been personalized, ranging from a splash of color along the sides and little collections of seashells glued decoratively around the boat's painted name, to banners and flags advertising that particular vendor's business, tips gently fluttering where they lay curled and fastened to their poles. On one of the larger boats, a crudely carved figure of a voluptuous mermaid stuck out of the prow, bold and immodest and drawing Deuce's eyes in bewildered amazement.

The sea breeze was warmer and drier here than out on the open water, the temperature lower than Sixis' tropical climate but still pleasant. Palm trees of the same breed as those lining the beaches of Sixis were here too, although there was that distinctly manmade feel to their placements on this island. They lined the path leading from the harbor steps down an ancient cobbled street into what Deuce assumed to be the center of the town, waving lazily in the breeze as if beckoning them into exploring their trail.

Returning Ace's excited grin, Deuce squeezed his hand in his before letting go of that reassuring warmth. “Here we are,” he said, almost trembling with excitement to be this close to civilization again, poised to take the first _real_ step into his new life alongside Ace.

“Here we are,” Ace echoed, beaming at him. “Welcome to sunny Tamarcela, Deuce.”

The name of the island hung in an arch over the steps leading up from the harbor, welcoming back fishermen from a hard day's work, encouraging visiting traders to enjoy their stay. Underneath the name swirled a couple of sentences that Deuce took the time to read, realizing quickly that it was the island's motto followed by further warm regards for visitors.

No mention of pirates – either good or bad – was to be found in the island's welcoming words decorating the outline of the curved wood, and for that, Deuce was pleased. Not that they could easily be identified as pirates just yet – to anyone who observed the two young newcomers, they would appear to be either tourists or perhaps far-flung family members of the locals of the sandy island, visiting after too many years apart. Though both sported various patches of peeling sunburn here and there, neither bore that distinct leathery tan of one of the local fishermen... although Ace's tan was indeed darker than when Deuce had first met him, while he himself just seemed to be getting better and better at impersonating a pink prawn.

Tearing his gaze away from the tan line barely visible above Ace’s belt, Deuce asked, “do you remember it from the maps yet?” because _he_ sure didn't.

Ace nodded happily, saying, “yeah, it's a teeny tiny island that's known for its fish exports and fun, lively atmosphere. The island’s so small it’s only got the one town, if I’m remembering it right. Funnily enough, it was my second choice after Sixis – kinda weird how I've ended up here anyway, huh? The guy I got my map from told me about it, see, but I was way more interested in Sixis' treasure than some fishing island at the time. And thank goodness I was!” He snorted at Deuce's bemused expression, clapped his hands together, and grinned so wide that all of his teeth showed. “Otherwise you’d be dead, and I’d still be lonely!”

“How're you feeling, by the way?” Deuce asked, quickly checking Ace over and cutting in before Ace continued on with whatever else he had been about to say, his mouth open mid-formation of a word. “You've just used your powers for six hours with only a couple of short breaks – are you feeling tired? Worn out? Do you want to sit down for a while? It's fine if you do, we aren't in any rush.”

His reassuring words would have carried far more weight if his stomach hadn't moaned its disapproval right at that moment, vehemently disagreeing that they were in no rush to go fill it up to bursting point. It had been a long time since their mid-morning snack, and even longer since breakfast, but Deuce grit his teeth together, jaw set, and ignored the awful sounds as best he could. Ace did not help the matter by glancing down at Deuce's abdomen, an amused smile lifting the corners of his mouth.

“I feel great,” Ace said, flexing a bicep with needless enthusiasm to demonstrate, “completely fine! Well,” he stopped, frowning and shifting his weight from foot to foot, causing him to sway on the spot, “no, I guess my calves ache a bit, actually. Nothing to worry about,” he added quickly, for Deuce flared up into anxiety far too readily, his concern clearly translating into his expression in some way he was ignorant to, “seriously, I think that's more to do with the fact I was stood up for a while, not the power. It's not bad, I promise.”

“Well, as long as you're sure,” Deuce conceded, his way of admitting that Ace was probably right, “but maybe you should take a break for a while before we go exploring.”

“Maybe,” Ace hummed, but Deuce rather got the impression that he was just humoring him. “So anyway, what first? You wanna find a room to hole up in and dump our things, or shall we cut to the chase and get to stuffing our faces?”

The lack of suggesting they work out how much it would cost to rent a room – and whether they had enough on them for it – did not go unnoticed, but did remain unchallenged for the time being. Although glad to have reached the same conclusion as Ace about their sleeping arrangements for the night, there were more pressing matters that Deuce’s stomach begged he address first.

“Food?” Deuce pointlessly clarified with a sudden burning hope, powerless to his Pavlovian response of practically drooling at the thought of it.

 _Food._ Actual _meals_. Actual, honest-to-goodness _meals_ comprising of more than just increasingly bland potatoes, of anything and everything except fish (which was going to prove itself a task, given the local staple), devoid of those squidgy mushrooms that Ace had sworn were edible, yet Deuce blamed entirely for his sudden (and temporary) loss of sensation at the tip of his tongue...

“ _Food_ ,” Ace nodded, an almost manic glint in his eyes as he leaned in. “As much food as we can eat. All of it. Anything you could possibly think of, I'm sure there'll be somewhere round here that serves it.”

Weak to the extraordinary _beauty_ of what Ace was promising him, Deuce felt his heart pound that little bit harder, a hand coming up to meet his mouth to hide the vacant expression that was taking over. “I want bread,” he almost moaned longingly, noting how Ace's face softened just at the mention of it, “great big rolls of fluffy bread.”

“And meat,” Ace sighed wistfully, “sizzling away, coated in barbecue sauce, enormous and fat and—”

“Slices of meat in huge, warm bread rolls—”

“With pasta, _so much_ pasta—”

“And a side of roasted root veg—”

“All honey glazed and crispy—”

“Maybe some potatoes thrown in there, too…”

“And desserts?”

“Yeah, _yeah_ , desserts… Huge mountains of cheesecake—”

“With heaps upon heaps of ice cream—”

“And covered in melted chocolate fudge—”

Ace shivered, grinning dreamily. “I’d shove my face into it,” he sighed, hopelessly in love with the idea, “just—grab the bowl and mash my face into it, no thoughts, no questions—”

Ah, Deuce was actually salivating behind his hand now, utterly helpless to it. With the stress of doing whatever it took to stay alive now gone, they were at last free to dream a little, to have goals to strive for rather than necessities to adhere to. They could fantasize about the mundane – and enjoy doing so, too – like this, like they were, drifting closer together the more they wound each other up with whirling narrations of all the food they'd ever enjoyed. The simplicity of the conversation, of Ace's eyes shining with genuine excitement that didn't encompass the needling pinprick of Sixis' brand of fear – it made Deuce suddenly and inexplicably appreciate life all over again.

Yet life still came with its demands, even for hungry, tired pirates exploring their first venture together. Life still clicked its fingers in irritation, ordering payment for the privilege of not starving, whether Deuce wanted to bring up the subject or not.

“I lost all the money I'd saved up back... back before Sixis,” Deuce admitted when a lull presented itself in the form of Ace wiping his mouth on the back of his fist. He couldn't bring himself to say the word _home_ anymore; wasn’t able to lie and pretend it had ever been anything of the sort. “I won't be able to pay for anything... I won’t have to get a job before I can eat, will I? I’m not sure I can last that long on our potato reserves…”

How jarring it was to suddenly have to worry about money.

How oddly _liberating_.

“Oh, you don't need to worry about money!” Ace said airily, dismissing Deuce's concerns with a wave of his hand. “I've got you covered – leave all that to me!”

“Really?” Deuce asked, eyes widening in astonishment. “Are you sure? You didn't lose it in the current or anything?”

Because _he_ had... in a manner of speaking.

As far as Ace was concerned – and as far as Ace would ever know – Deuce's carefully hoarded savings had been lost along with most of his other affects when the ant lion current had wreaked havoc on his little craft, condemning him to Sixis.

However, such was not really the case. On his second day on Sixis, after confirming once and for all that there really was no magical way off the island and he was not going to find anything edible, Deuce had become furiously hysterical.

During this outburst of the severity he could only liken to that of a child who had been denied a second helping of dessert, Deuce had gone through something akin to the five stages of grief. When at the height of rage of the likes he hadn't even known could exist within a person before that point, Deuce had abruptly crumbled into bargaining with the sea itself, throwing fistfuls of beris into the waves in a crazed attempt to buy a miracle. It reminded him somewhat of the gullible people in the town center; they would flip loose change into the fountain that categorically would not make one pass an exam or get the girl of their dreams, hoping for an outcome that they ultimately controlled.

Deuce at least had the decency to look at his boots rather than into Ace's lacking-in-rage-induced-money-flinging eyes, innocence and benign composure seeming to dance in them in comparison to the memory of that particular breakdown.

“I didn't lose any money to the current,” Ace said cheerfully, taking Deuce by the hand again before he could reflexively flinch away, “so you don't have to worry about that.” He squeezed Deuce's hand tight, summoning his gaze to be lifted and held by wide, almost electric silver that _dazzled_. “You trust me, don't you?”

_With my life. With my everything._

“Of course I do.”

“Then everything's gonna be okay,” Ace grinned; Deuce only now noticed how his cheeks rather adorably dimpled ever so slightly when he beamed that hard. “I'll get you your bread, and your pasta, and all the meat you could ever want. We’ll be fine dining today Deuce _,_ and then we're gonna hit the town and spread the good word about the Spade pirates.”

For the moment, Deuce didn't care about what came after their meal. Ace could have decided that they were going to break into a bank, and Deuce would have quite happily agreed to it. His stomach groaned loudly, wailing for immediate satisfaction—and then so did Ace's, in sync as usual and earning a snort from both pirates.

With the smile that Ace had gifted to him – the one that felt natural, felt _right_ – tugging at the corners of his lips, Deuce allowed himself to be led by the hand under the island's _Welcome_ sign, vaguely wondering just how much cash Ace had stashed away and where, given that he couldn't remember seeing any in his bag at any point.

* * *

When he had been young – perhaps as small as four or five – Deuce had been taken to a carnival or festival of sorts along with his brother. The duller, more mundane details of the night were lost somewhere in the foggier parts of his memory by now, but certain aspects associated with heightened emotion remained fond and comforting.

It had been the lights that captured his attention so wholly. Sitting astride a pair of shoulders with his small fingers wound into silky pale hair, Deuce-before-Deuce had stared, mesmerized, by the strings of multi-colored lights crisscrossing between stalls and displays, wending their way down into the beating heart of the night.

Though he could no longer remember whose shoulders those had been, he was at least certain that it had not been his father who had plucked him up and sat him there, giggling fit to burst. His father's hair was dark – now flecked with gray – as was his brother's... not that he thought for a moment that his brother could have lifted him over his head at any age, even if he had wanted to.

It was at this festival that he had first heard live music of the rhythmic, colorful variety rather than the typical _cultured_ notes one might expect to hear from a hired ensemble at a dinner party his father hosted or attended. There was nothing bland about these notes, nothing that hindered the brilliant imagination of a child who found solace not in all things refined, but in the pearlescent currents of fantasy. He had squirmed astride those shoulders, squealing the moment his ride had rounded a corner and come face to face with a troupe, or a band, of sorts, the likes which he doubted he would ever be able to forget, the memory being one that was so viscerally felt when recalled.

Out on errands, his hand crushed in the grip of his bustling father lest he slip away, Deuce had on occasion caught snatches of a different, more captivating way of life. His attention each time was captured by the colorful, ensnared by the hints of discovering something less dreary and cold, when those who dared to dream outside of the confines of mansions and medical practices wended their way through the thronging crowds. They tantalized, and they teased, and their almost inexorable pull resulted in scolding for allowing himself to be led by something so _unrefined_ , as his father had put it.

But this… being _allowed_ to stop and stare; to gaze open-mouthed until his hunger for the extraordinary began to border on sated… it had awoken something within him, though he couldn’t have possibly been aware of it at the time.

A group of people like he had never witnessed up close, the troupe had been decked out in vibrantly beautiful clothes that his father would have certainly scorned, had he been there. Long, flowing ribbons of satin wove around their bodies like brilliantly colored streamers, calling out to him to touch, to feel their energy translate through that fabric that flashed arcs through the air in their dance. Enormous, golden hoops dangled and swayed from the earlobes of the women like miniature hula-hoops, some studded with decorative stars or moons, some plain bands that caught the strings of lights overhead.

Tinkling bells attached to their ankles chiming merrily with each learned, precise step, their whole bodies their tools used to expertly create their music and dance, spinning, twirling, smiling, _shining_. Their dynamism - their beat, rhythm, ebb and flow and erratically exact steps and dips, bends and claps - contrasted violently with the little boy's rigidly formal world, inviting him into something so breathtakingly phantasmagorical he had started crying, overwhelmed.

Wiping his eyes with his fists, Deuce had been lifted from the shoulders of his caretaker and set on the floor, a gentle hand bearing a soft scrap of material soothing away the tears. No, definitely not his father, nor any of the house staff, each of them employed to be strict and curt rather than surrogates for affection.

This was someone who gave appropriate affection to a little boy so bursting with ‘unnecessary’ compassion and empathy for all he met and knew.

This was someone who he had loved, though their face was scratched out of his memory, the removal deliberate, the consequence melancholic.

He remembered the words spoken to him in that moment, but not the inflection, nor anything else of the person behind them. He remembered a formless smile that spread with reassuring calm, the shape of the person's lips forming his permission:

_Would you like to dance, darling?_

He had, though admitting to it was difficult, his whimper stifled into the back of his hand. He wanted to, but Father would never allow for such foolish behavior, the borders of his tiny world already cracking under the strain of conflicting feelings. Even back then, Deuce had wondered why his father had allowed him to attend the festival at all that day, quite certain that it was an event that would have normally earned a sneer and a cold quip about professionalism and appearances.

It hadn't taken long to calm him down and stem the flow of tears, buoying him back up to jittery excitement as he had rushed ahead, drawing up shyly before the performers and their pipes, their flutes, their drums. Bouncing on the balls of his feet, he had taken the hand of one of the performing flutists when she kindly bent to offer it, outstretched and smiling, encouraging the small boy to follow her lead into a world of reeling color and light.

His last memory of that moment was one that, when recalled, presented itself as a snapshot framed by lasting and inexplicable happiness. He had turned his head to beam at his caretaker, thrilled and a little bemused to find himself in the midst of a troupe so ethereal and surreal.

Though they had been standing there, watching him closely, it was as if through a shimmering border of kinds. They became strangely abstract as he spun hand in hand with the flutist, a part of his world and yet not, real and yet gone forever.

He didn't remember their name or their relation to him.

All that remained of them after that night was the scrap of cloth they had used to dry his eyes, drifting through like a firework exploding into vivid life only to burn away, never to be seen again.

* * *

It was the strings of multi-colored garlands that they noticed first, Ace pointing them out as they made their way towards the center of the town along the palm tree-lined sandy path. Snaking their way along in a procession from tree to tree, lamp to lamp, the garlands fluttered on the breeze as Ace pointed to them. They stirred the memory of that little boy bursting with joy on the troupe's mat, waving a borrowed tambourine about his head while laughing shrilly, and Deuce dithered for a moment, pondering whether to bore Ace with such a pointless story.

Deciding against it, he trotted after Ace, though struggled to direct his attention away from the colors and their hidden promise of something unknown and exciting.

Next came the first faint burst of music, reaching both their ears at the same moment as it floated over from the direction of the town center. Lively, crisp notes of pipes and strings intertwined above the deep bass of the drums, sparking into life the sudden and irresistible urge to sway with the beat – something that Ace quite happily succumbed to on stopping in his tracks, perked up and alert like a cat who had spotted a sparrow.

“You hear that?” Ace asked, clearly exhilarated by the music, his eyes shining. “Sounds like there's something fun going on in town.”

“Yeah,” Deuce agreed, willing himself not to physically react to the cheerful melody like Ace was, “you wanna go check it out, or try to avoid it?” Not that he thought they could, given that they were heading straight for the music as it was. To his secret delight, Ace shot him a look that suggested he thought Deuce mad to propose this. “Right, point taken,” Deuce smiled, “but getting food's still our priority, okay?”

“Obviously,” Ace snorted, “gonna get me some ribs, and fries, maybe—”

“Don't start that again,” Deuce moaned, hunger stinging him once again. “Let's see what we can find. Hopefully they’ll have a hotel with free rooms with meals as part of the package.”

“Hotel?” Ace asked, and when Deuce frowned in confusion, he said, “you _did_ say hotel, right?”

“Yeah. Why?” He could feel himself going red already, could feel their societal gap stretching like a rift between them no matter how much he may try to bridge it, to leave his side entirely.

But Ace only snickered, looking at Deuce with… pity? Was that pity?

“What?” Deuce demanded a little too forcefully, perhaps a touch too dramatically. “You still sleep in hotels as a pirate, right? Or do pirates only sleep on boats no matter what?” Now that he thought about it, maybe that was right; it wasn't like he exactly knew much about pirates, having grown up avoiding them and anything to do with them like they were particularly malicious germs.

But Ace just laughed heartily, deigning the moment fit for a genial slap on Deuce's arm. “Nah, it's not that,” he said, grinning at him, “more like... Hotels are for rich people, aren't they? And we’re not rich people.”

“Are they?” Deuce asked, astonished. “But you can get cheap hotels, right?”

“Well sure, but even a cheap hotel's gonna be more expensive than an inn will be,” Ace pointed out. Even as he spoke he continued with his little jig to the distant music, bouncing on the spot in time with it. It was somewhat endearing… in a distracting sort of manner. “We can't afford to be throwing cash around on things we don't strictly need, and I'd much rather pitch up your jacket on a couple of sticks and camp under that than shell out on a fancy room.”

“I wasn't suggesting a fancy place.” Deuce did his absolute best to keep the whine out of his voice, the pout from pursing his lips—yet rejection set in to whisper its cruel, venomous lies as ever, working to convince him of a mocking edge to Ace's words that categorically had not been present. He ignored it as best he could though, taking refuge in Ace's smile instead, choosing the truth he saw there. “But we do need somewhere we can rest, and somewhere to leave our things while we make plans. I'm not sure how I feel about sleeping on the Striker, either.”

Or, rather, he was completely certain where his feelings lay in that regard, but as they were in no way positive, playing himself as vague seemed the best option for now.

“Can't argue with that!” Ace beamed. “I'm sure you'd love to sleep in a real bed again too, huh?”

_Yes._

“I wouldn't complain if something happened and we had to sleep outside again,” Deuce shrugged, lying through his teeth. The look Ace gave him confirmed that he was woefully transparent, his ability to lie not being one of his skills to have improved during their stint on Sixis. “Anyway,” he said hastily, nodding down the sandy road as an excuse to look away from Ace, “an inn, was it? Is that what we're going to look for?”

“Yup!” Ace affirmed, hitching his bag higher up his shoulder with a jolt. “Let's get settled and then go find the party!”

 _The party_ referring, of course, to the source of the lively music.

It didn't take long to stumble across their first inn a couple of minutes into their conversation turning back to food once again, but after one look at Deuce's face to gauge his feelings on the place, Ace casually suggested that they didn't have to settle for the first place they happened upon, even if their prices did seem a little too good to be true.

Deuce wasn't sure which was the final straw that had him deciding that they weren't setting foot in that building, but it was probably a close tie between the front door being propped up against the doorframe rather than swinging on its hinges, or the fact that none of the windows seemed to have managed to survive a violent attack on their panes. Indeed, the street around the inn was littered with diamonds of glass – which did, Deuce conceded, lend to the illusion of the drunk slumped against the wall being surrounded by tiny stars.

The further into the heart of the island they wandered, the more people they spotted going about their daily lives. Ace, as ever, seemed to know more about this island than Deuce had ever known of his own home town, quite happily narrating little bits of information here and there, seemingly thriving on Deuce's bewildered interest now that he knew where he was. According to him, Tamarcela comprised of this one singular town that spanned the whole island, seeing as the island itself was barely bigger than Sixis. Its population relied heavily on their fishing trade with the far larger islands nearby, but they also made a nice additional income from tourists looking to experience their decadent festivals.

“They throw a festival on the last day of every month to welcome in the next, as well as for annual things like the New Year,” Ace explained, turning on his heel when Deuce stopped abruptly to watch a kite stream overhead, sure that there was prose to be found in the string flapping wildly underneath it, the child some 50 feet away who was screaming their misery for their lost toy. “They're all generally _in the moment_ kind of people here, from what I've heard, so they make the most of what life brings them.”

“That sounds kinda nice,” Deuce murmured, “feeling genuinely happy for the sun coming up in the morning. Guess they appreciate all the little things in life we tend to take for granted.”

“Yeah, sure sounds like it,” Ace agreed, patting Deuce on the back to prompt him into moving again, tearing his attention away from the kite. “But hey, if the festival's today, then that means tomorrow's April!”

April?

Deuce blinked at him, words having lost meaning for a moment, significance bypassing him, until—

_Ah. April._

Still not even two weeks since Deuce had left his old life—still not even two weeks since he had found his home trudging along the sand, first mistaken for a figment of his rapidly declining state of mind.

A life that had belonged to another man, the memories of which Deuce could recall, but no longer feel the icy sting of.

The warmth of Ace's palm to his back ignited him into stepping into sync with him, sharing his smile.

The next inn they spotted seemed far more to their tastes, and Ace's eyes practically shone with delight when Deuce nodded his approval, satisfied. It advertised itself by way of a chalkboard propped up against its white-washed outer wall, bearing a welcoming message that had been lovingly detailed in pink cursive entwined with tiny yellow flowers. A rather generic message of sorts, Deuce just had time to read the words:

_“Madam Malva's Homely Inn! Basic rooms available from 3000 beri a night, or with a hot evening meal and breakfast next morning from 4500 beri (enquire inside for more prices and details). Drop in for a drink and a smile from our friendly bar staff!”_

Beneath the last sentence beamed a drawn sunflower with sunglasses; it appeared to be waving a beer, but Deuce barely had the time to study it in any sort of detail before Ace was pushing him through the doorway, hands on his shoulders as he bounced from foot to foot, loudly wondering if they could serve up steak straight away.

The swell of music in the air was getting to them both, rinsing them of the lingering fatigue both physical and mental, and it granted Deuce enough respite from his own mind to offer Ace a smile over his shoulder. While still not used to Ace's casual physical touches and apparent love of being in constant contact with him, Deuce couldn't pretend to himself that he was growing to... not quite enjoy them yet, but to _expect_ them, if nothing else, even if he couldn't quite bring himself to think further on the matter right now.

A bell tinkled merrily as the door (blessedly still attached to its hinges) swung open into the inn. Deuce's first impression was that they had walked into something of a tavern bar that had been built into the fussy, frilly living room of a middle-aged woman, which, surprisingly, wasn't actually a bad thing at all, lending itself the homely feeling that had been advertised outside.

The bar that spanned almost the entire length of the back wall was constructed out of pale birch rather than anything that seemed to be growing locally. The windows, all tall and wide and thrown open to admit the warm breeze, allowed for the early afternoon sun to pour in; little dust motes drifted idly through a sunbeam that the two pirates passed through, whirling in their wake.

Yet the place was clean – spotlessly so – with no drunks rolling around on the floor in stereotypical fashion, quite eliminating any assumptions of what would be found in an inn fit for pirates—each patron was firmly seated at their stools or seats, laughing and talking over drinks and little shared baskets of fries or plates of sandwiches.

Instead, the bar top appeared to be covered in what Deuce could only guess were hand-colored paper doilies, each delicate mat sporting different patterns and bursts of colors in wheels and stripes. A sprinkling of beer mats had also been scattered over the bar at strategic intervals, the unspoken rule clearly being that one didn't thump their foamy glasses and tankards down onto the fragile doilies.

Interest piqued, Deuce scanned up and down the bar while Ace drummed his fingers on the wood - not a single doily was ripped, tattered, or bore the obvious patches of water marks that one might expect to see.

Trotting over from the other end of the bar with her long black ponytail swinging cheerfully, the young barmaid's smile seemed to radiate warmth as she approached them. Her uniform compromised of plain black pants and a simple green plaid shirt tied into a bow at her navel which, judging by the lack of said bow on the other visible server's shirt, seemed to be a personal touch. An apron was fastened about her hips, jingling with the melody of loose change as she moved, adding to the softly wholesome impression of the inn.

“This place is _nice_ ,” Deuce murmured, gaze trailing upwards to the pewter tankards hanging from the exposed wooden beam above the bar; Ace hummed in agreement beside him, leaning in on his elbows.

“Welcome to Madam Malva's!” The barmaid chimed, her smile infectious. “What can I get you boys? Drinks? Maybe some food?”

She couldn't have been more than a couple of years older than them, so calling them _boys_ rang somewhat awkwardly in Deuce's ears. Ace, however, didn't seem to care or notice.

“First of all, have you got any rooms available for tonight?” Ace asked, seemingly oblivious to how his stomach growled at the mention of food. “And if so, how much is a double room? Can we book one?”

“A twin room,” Deuce quickly corrected, already envisioning the stupid cliché moment of opening the door to the bedroom and gasping in dramatic horror at the sight of a single double bed, “he means a room for two people, with two beds.”

“Isn't that what a double room is?” Ace frowned at him.

“Uh, no. Not at all.”

The frown deepened still further. “So it’s not like _'double the people, double the beds'_?”

When Deuce only gave him a look that spoke volumes of his waning patience, Ace just looked mildly surprised, turning his attention back to the barmaid; her smile had taken on a scandalous edge, as if she had just witnessed something that would make for juicy gossip with the other barmaid later on.

“A twin room, then,” Ace corrected himself. “I think he's had enough of me snuggling him in his sleep.”

The urge to pull his jacket up over his head and pretend he didn't exist was suddenly almost overpowering, Deuce discovered on hastily looking away when he caught the barmaid's amused gaze. Perhaps he should explain about Sixis, launch himself into a long and rambling and increasingly frantic retelling of their near-death experience and how Ace had used his powers to keep him warm through the freezing nights... or perhaps he should just tell himself that the barmaid didn't know them and most likely didn't really care about the lives of two strangers.

“This your first time here?” The barmaid asked conversationally, pulling out a clipboard from under the counter. When she noticed their blank expressions, she added, “to Tamarcela, I mean. Have you ever visited before? I don't recognize you.”

“Bet you recognize everyone local, huh?” Ace asked. The barmaid smiled indulgently.

“We all know each other, yeah,” she agreed, “and sometimes we get to know regular visitors.”

Ace nodded eagerly, saying, “we're brand new and ready to explore.” He nudged Deuce, who only grunted in agreement, having not recovered from his embarrassment yet.

“Didja travel far?” The barmaid pointedly directed her question at Deuce, who, caught off guard, merely stuttered something incomprehensible in his search for words.

“We came here from Sixis,” Ace answered for him, coming to his rescue, “so not too far away. Lovely day for a nice trip across the sea.”

The barmaid's eyebrows disappeared up into her bangs, disbelief written all over her face. “From Sixis?” She repeated, obviously not believing him.

“Uh-huh. We're pirates!” Ace announced for no reason that Deuce could discern, throwing an arm around his shoulders and squeezing him, quite ignoring how he struggled, spluttering. “The Spade pirates! Newly formed!”

Deuce couldn't help but notice how her disbelief seemed to intensify, her expression softening from dubious to something more indulgently patronizing, like how an adult might feign interest in the plate of mud presented to them by a child, pretending to tuck in and rubbing their tummy in exaggerated delight. She didn't believe them at all, and really, Deuce couldn't say he blamed her one bit.

“Are you really?” Even her tone was gently condescending, though not mean.

“Yeah, but you don't need to worry, we're not going to cause trouble for you,” Ace said kindly, “we just want a room, and maybe some food, if you're still happy to serve us.”

“Oh, sure.” Deuce didn't like how she pursed her lips together, obviously trying not to laugh. “We cater for pirates all the time; Madam Malva doesn't discriminate, so long as you can pay; she'll make you regret crossing her if you run out on her, though.”

Deuce shot Ace a worried glance, which went completely ignored. He still hadn't asked exactly how much cash Ace had on him, and he didn't like the sound of begging for mercy from an enraged inn owner should they overspend and find themselves short.

“Wait here and I'll call her down – she deals with the room bookings.” She trotted over to the doorway behind the bar, the short corridor just visible through there evidently leading to a staircase, from what Deuce could see. Inhaling deeply, she bellowed, “Madam Malva! We've got a couple looking to book a room tonight!”

“Couple of pirates!” Ace yelled, leaning over the bar, oblivious to Deuce's distressed groan at the barmaid's phrasing.

“A couple of pirates,” the barmaid corrected herself; Deuce could see her smirking. Maybe it wasn't too late to turn around and leave, regardless of how nice this inn was. “They say they're from Sixis!”

He was suddenly rather unsure whether he wanted to meet this Madam Malva. Whatever the barmaid may have said, Deuce was drawing together a rather sinister image of a woman who greatly resembled a stereotypical mafia boss, ready to break the kneecaps of those who wronged her and her family. The inn would serve as a nice disguise, wouldn't it, with all its colorful doilies and sunshine and homecooked meals on plates that looked like they wouldn't be out of place on a happy family's dining table.

To his right, Ace took the moment's pause to inspect one of the doilies, tracing the edge of it with a forefinger. Opening his mouth to ask what Ace was thinking – for he was clearly stuck on something important, frowning at the colorful paper – Deuce found himself cut off by a thud before he could get the words out.

“Pirates from Sixis?” A new voice – a woman's, strong and full – asked from the stairs, hidden from view.

“So they say,” the barmaid said with the hint of a smile to her tone. “They're asking for a twin room. Here,” she handed the clipboard over, “all yours.”

“Thank you, Cari,” Madam Malva said affectionately. “Would you be a dear and go help Mr. Marin in room three? He seems to have misplaced his toupee again.”

When she descended the last step and rounded the corner, the only word that sprang to Deuce's mind was... motherly.

Madam Malva was rather short, rather wide, and rather inspired a sense of calm in Deuce that he hadn't expected possible from someone he didn't even know. Her wavy auburn hair was pulled up into a loose bun, the sleeves of her flower-print dress rolled up to her elbows, exposing freckled forearms thick with muscle and shiny with tan. The bridge of her nose looked burnt, as if she had been out in the sun but forgotten to apply sunscreen to that one singular area, unfortunately drawing attention to it. Kind, honey-brown eyes roved over Ace first, then Deuce, scrutinizing them in the same manner that Deuce's old family housekeeper had done when he was younger, her eagle eyes trained to spot any dirt or creases that might pose risk of irritating his father.

Madam Malva's eyes swept from Deuce's shoulders down to Ace's hand on the counter, fingers still absently tracing the outline of the doily. He snatched his hand back and shoved it in his pocket before she could say anything, suddenly standing up a little straighter and looking that little more attentive, almost as if he were in school and she were his teacher.

Yet Madam Malva didn't scold him; in fact, she didn't say anything at all to their combined surprise. A frown creased her brow as she continued to sweep them with her appraising stare, clearly concentrating on something that they weren't privy too as she hummed in thought.

“Uh,” Ace began with an uncertain glance at Deuce, who returned it, “so, yeah, nice to meet you. We'd like to—”

But Madam Malva shushed him. After another handful of strained seconds spent considering them, she asked, “Sixis, you say?”

Ace and Deuce looked at each other; Ace looked nervous now, and Deuce was reasonably sure he wasn't exactly projecting confidence himself. What an odd way to introduce oneself.

“Yeah,” Ace said slowly, “we built a boat that broke through the currents, and then came straight here. We're pretty tired,” he added, as if sharing this information would make her cut to the chase and offer them a room rather than quiz them on banal trivia.

Madam Malva snorted in obvious disbelief but didn't question this further, just leaning in closer on one shiny forearm. From her apron pocket stuck the end of what looked like a pipe, Deuce noticed, the end of it showing evidence of being chewed on.

“First time away from home?” She asked, changing tack at the speed of light, leaving Deuce reeling. “Thought so,” she nodded despite neither of them responding in any way, “yeah, thought so all right. When was the last time either of you washed?”

The question caught Ace off guard as much as it did Deuce, judging by the way he gaped at Madam Malva. A nervous hiccup of a laugh issued from Deuce against his will, suddenly acutely aware of every single person in the large room. Any of them could be listening in; any of them could be silently judging, only pretending to be enjoying their drinks and conversations they appeared caught up in, when really they were thinking along the same lines as what Madam Malva had baldly addressed.

 _You stink,_ was what she was saying, what her kind eyes conveyed. _Your stench is so offensive that I can't believe neither of you have done anything about it yet_.

 _Well, sorry, Madam Malva,_ Deuce argued back in his mind, not daring to say anything out loud, intrusively aware of how his cheeks were flushing with heat, _having a bath's hardly going to be a priority, is it?_

“Dunno,” Ace said bluntly, clearly bristling in the same manner as Deuce, “not for at least two weeks, though. It's kinda hard to wash when you're conserving water and not dying, y'see.”

“I don't doubt that,” Madam Malva said seriously, perfectly unfazed, consulting her clipboard carefully, “and I wasn't judging you two, so you can stop with the raised hackles. I'm a momma without any babies to tend to; if I see kids like you looking bereft and tattered, of course I'm gonna be concerned about your welfare, aren't I?”

That didn't strictly follow any logic that Deuce knew of, but Ace moaned a soft _oh!_ of understanding.

“I'm sorry,” Ace began before Deuce could fully wrap his head around what she was trying to imply, inclining his head, “I didn't consider—”

“Of course you didn't,” Madam Malva said firmly, though she wore a kind smile on her thin lips, “but no harm done, no harm done at all. Yes, we have one room left for a couple of nights – you're very lucky, boys. Not the best room at the inn I'm afraid, but you'll be set up nice enough. Rooms usually sell out stupid-quick on the nights around Finem Mensis, but old Daryl from up on the lighthouse decided against taking up his usual room with me. Said he didn't feel right leaving the lighthouse to the youngsters just yet. If you ask me, he's just a proud old fool who won't admit he's not ready to let someone else work his mirrors and lights.” She heaved an enormous sigh, indifferent to the bemused glances Ace and Deuce exchanged. “Anyway, follow me; I'll get you your keys and set you up nicely. Just come round the bar here where the panel lifts, that's it. Jollie, you'll be ok by yourself until Cari comes back down, won't you?”

“Aye, Madam Malva,” the other barmaid chirped.

Paint peeled in curls on the banisters of the stairs leading up to the floors above, the effect strangely at odds with how impeccable the front of the inn was. They creaked on their climb, Madam Malva leading the way at a pace that frustrated Deuce to no end. He wasn't sure how Ace managed it, but he responded politely to each of her scattered comments about the festival tonight, the state of the port, and how nice it was to meet a pair of pirates who were so civil.

“Most come barging into my inn, swinging their weight around and demanding drinks from the girls,” she said with a shake of her head as she fussed in the key cabinet on the wall of her office, a tiny little room that barely contained a desk and some beaten up-looking filing cabinets. “Stop crowding,” she barked, waving a hand at Ace and Deuce, who had crammed themselves in after her, “goodness knows you stink like the fish market on a summer's day— c'mon, out, out!”

When she unlocked their bedroom door a moment later, Madam Malva further surprised them by plucking Ace's bag off his shoulder and holding out her hand expectantly for Deuce's, barring their entry into the room with her bulk.

“Not yet, you don't,” she said in that same no-nonsense tone when Deuce tried to argue, clinging to the strap of his bag, “I'm going to dump your things in there, and then you're both getting in the bath.” She pinned them with a steely glare, her words not inviting protest or arguments. “You're both _filthy_. You can't be comfortable like that, surely? I can't imagine you're not at _least_ feeling all itchy and gross. No, I'm not hearing it,” she clapped her large hands together over the sound of Ace attempting to defend himself, to perhaps whine that she could do whatever the hell she wanted after he'd at least had a moment to flop down on his bed – which was exactly what Deuce had been about to demand. “Bath first, then you can have a little rest while I rustle up a late lunch for you both. How does that sound?”

Ace pinned his intense stare on Deuce, wide-eyed and imploring him not to make a fuss, to just go along with whatever this clearly mad woman was trying to force them into. Like he had a leg to stand on— _he_ had been the one trying to shuffle around Madam Malva to break into the bedroom, failing miserably.

“That sounds fine,” Deuce mumbled, conceding defeat, much to his stomach’s misery. “I guess it _would_ be a good idea to get cleaned up sooner rather than later...”

Though he didn't want to admit it, they _were_ pretty disgusting. Like Deuce had done, Ace must have stopped noticing their state of decay pretty rapidly while on Sixis, neither caring about just how disheveled the other appeared when there were more important things to be worrying about. Hair lank and greasy, sunburns peeling, and, of course, stinking to high heaven, they really were worse for wear, their pitiful state suddenly glaringly obvious in contrast with Madam Malva's radiant complexion, burned nose notwithstanding; next to Cari the pretty barmaid, they must have looked virtually comparable to pigs roiling in swill, Deuce thought with a defeated sigh.

“Come to think of it, it feels like I have sand stuck up my—” Ace caught Madam Malva's eye, “uh—in my boots.”

When Madam Malva nodded approvingly and closed the door again, Ace unmistakably mouthed the words _ass crack_ to Deuce behind her back. Deuce pointedly rolled his eyes, earning a snicker back from Ace. Forget just in his underwear – Deuce felt like he had sand in his ears, his nose, under his nails... just about everywhere that sand could get, he was sure he had it there.

Honestly speaking, Deuce wasn't entirely sure what to make of Madam Malva... or Ace's change in behavior from confident and sure to meekly doing whatever was demanded of him, seemingly perfectly happy to have orders barked at him. That wasn't the Ace that Deuce knew, or who Deuce assumed Ace to be when faced with situations that tried to bend his will into shapes he lacked the flexibility to assume – it rendered him feeling a little lost and bemused as he placidly followed after Ace to the bathroom, wondering just how on earth they had gone from talking about steak and bread to being forcibly made to wash by a woman who seemed to fancy herself something of a mother figure to two complete strangers.

In theory, Deuce knew that people were wide and varied in their approaches to others and to life as a whole, but that understanding had previously only been applied to trying to understand the minds of the downtrodden, the destitute, and those whose morals were scrupulous to the likes of someone like him. He had never considered applying that tagline of _everybody's different_ to someone so seemingly kind and big-hearted before.

Because Madam Malva shone with affection, her movements laced with kindness born from a heart that loved everyone and everything in her world. Her inn bore that evidence from doily to cleanliness to even the pink pen stuck behind her ear. She loved through her actions, through her pursuit in supplying strangers with comfort and somewhere clean and secure to return to no matter what, no judgement passed.

It was with this clear care that she began to run water into the truly enormous old-fashioned tub with clawed brass feet, the drum of the water echoing off the tiles. Bending over to test the temperature with her elbow (which fascinated Deuce, yet didn't seem to come as a surprise to Ace), she chattered away to Ace about how Daryl the lighthouse man had tiled the bathroom for her 'as a favor'. This last part was said with such significance that even Deuce, who had been lost in his own thoughts and staring unseeing at the bubbles beginning to froth up in the water, looked up at her, eyebrows raised.

“Yes,” Madam Malva said significantly, nodding at Deuce, “that silly fool owes me for a lot of things, he does. Poured a whole lot of love into that man, I did, and am still here waiting to see it all pay off. But anyway,” she straightened up with a heavy exhale, gave her arm a shake, and looked expectantly between Ace and Deuce, “why are you both just standing there?”

Ace shot Deuce a thoroughly perplexed look, thankfully absolutely not on Madam Malva's wavelength whatsoever. He looked just as lost as Deuce felt, perhaps even sharing the same curious sensation that by stepping over the threshold downstairs, they had somehow entered a parallel universe in which Madam Malva made perfect sense and they were completely clued in on what the hell was going on. One minute they were booking a room; the next they were stood waiting for this woman to run a bath for them like they were three and this was a standard afternoon routine for them.

On some level, Deuce really wanted to laugh and break into hysterics, the situation hilariously at odds with the life they had left behind only that morning on Sixis' beach.

On another level – the level that Deuce found himself tiredly collapsing on in his mind – he really just wanted to sleep for 24 hours on a bed that didn't result in him being coated in sand for a change.

Madam Malva, however, was not impressed with their bewildered silence. _Tsk_ ing to herself, she frowned at them before asking, “what're your names, anyway? I can't keep referring to you two as _you_ , can I?”

“Oh,” Ace looked thoroughly relieved to be able to answer this question, “yes, right, how rude of us. I'm Portgas D. Ace, and this is Masked Deuce—”

“Just Deuce,” Deuce hurriedly interrupted, “there's no _Masked_ to my name. Just Deuce. _Just Deuce_ ,” he repeated firmly when Ace turned his wounded puppy eyes onto him, looking hurt and betrayed, “nothing else.”

“But you wear a mask,” Ace said as if it weren't blatantly obvious, “and it makes you look like a superhero, kinda, so therefore you're Masked Deuce. Pirates have gotta have cool names, I think.”

Deuce snorted, battling back the urge to roll his eyes. “And you wear a cowboy hat – does that make you Cowboy Ace, by your own logic?”

“Woah, hey now,” it was Ace's turn to frown, giving Deuce the impression that he had just mortally offended him, “don't erase my surname—”

“I'm not, I'm saying that as a pirate, you should have _a cool pirate name_ too if I've got to have one,” Deuce said somewhat smugly, smirking at Ace's reluctant acceptance that maybe he had just been played at his own game. “I'll be Masked Deuce if you'll be Cowboy Ace.”

Ace paused for a moment, thinking, then whined, “but I want my full name on my _Wanted_ poster.”

Of course he did. Deuce knew that; Ace knew that Deuce knew that. The goal was to get Ace's name out there, plastered to every noticeboard in the world, civilians and pirates alike knowing of the captain of the Spade pirates, knowing of his strength and quest to become the best of the best, surpassing Roger's worldwide title. To Deuce, this goal seemed like some kind of far-off dream, something that would be achievable only through careful planning and dedicated hard work... the thought of which suddenly made standing here in a steamy bathroom, arguing about names, feel very childish and a waste of time.

“You should definitely have _Masked Deuce_ on yours, though, when we get noticed enough to have them,” Ace muttered, deliberately avoiding Deuce's glare, “'cause it's really cool...”

“It really isn't,” Deuce sighed, “and I'm not calling myself that, so drop it.”

The mischievous sparkle in Ace's eyes told Deuce on no uncertain terms that he was not going to do so. Before he could address this embarrassment, though, Madam Malva cleared her throat.

“I wish I hadn't asked,” she commented, amused. “You boys are seriously called Ace and Deuce? What're your other crewmates' names? Trey? Cater? Cinque?” She cackled to herself, laughter raspy. Deuce was reasonably certain the joke went over Ace's head entirely, but he politely laughed along regardless. “I take it _Deuce_ isn't your real name, sweetheart?”

“It is,” Deuce said shortly, “it's as real a name as anyone else's.”

The fact that this name had been received from Ace was irrelevant; the fact that this identity was only a week old did not make it any less real, any less _right_. He wasn't the man who had sailed from father to island, looking for a fresh start – he was the pirate who had departed Sixis with his captain, and nothing more. He didn't need to be anything more than that.

“His birth name's Cletus,” Ace said with an infuriatingly mean smirk at Deuce, “so you can't blame him for trying to forget it.”

His squawk of pain on Deuce's foot connecting with his thigh echoed wildly off the tiles, magnified in the small space.

“Right, well, the bath's all ready for you both,” Madam Malva said with a sigh, indicating at the bubble-filled tub, “so if you want to give me your clothes, I'll go get to work on scrubbing them nice and clean for you both.” She beamed at them, apparently taking no notice of how they frowned at her, mouths agape and not daring to ask the question they shared. “Well, come on,” she said, gesturing at Deuce, who was nearest, first, “I've got other things to do than wait around for your laundry, dears, so if you wouldn't mind—”

But Deuce took a step back, cold, prickling fear flooding through him. No way. There was no way she was being serious right now. Absolutely no way.

But she wasn’t kidding, giving him a look that challenged his defiance, spoke volumes of her assessment that he was a naughty child and she the tired, irritated parent right at this moment.

“I'm not getting undressed with an audience.” Ah, he sounded thin and squeaky rather than projecting the bold, confident tone he had been aiming for, making himself sound every bit as horrified as he felt.

He didn't dare look at Ace, either, feeling himself flush violently red at just the thought of doing so. Had it not been enough to have to go through this every day on Sixis for the sake of fishing? Was this his punishment for surviving, perhaps, and now the universe deemed it necessary to push him one article of clothing further? Was this what he should expect from life as a pirate: a life without dignity or privacy?

Because Ace had started undressing. Right there in front of him and Madam Malva. First came off the shirt, revealing the tattoo on his upper arm and the dark freckles spanning his shoulders. Next, he crouched to start pulling off his boots, all while giving off the air of one entirely unperturbed by this turn of events.

Indeed, Madam Malva didn't even glance at him outside of an approving nod, instead busying herself with grabbing a small wicker laundry basket from out of a cupboard built into the wall. She was acting like her request was perfectly normal, that Ace's decision to do as he was told in this regard to be something normal and expected, and that _Deuce_ was the odd one out here for tugging his jacket closed in a subconscious attempt to protect himself.

“I said I'm not getting undressed,” he tried again, shooting a furious look at Ace when he straightened up again, belt clinking merrily as he unbuckled it.

“Then you're going to be very miserable later on when you're sitting in sopping wet clothes,” Madam Malva said with a raised eyebrow, her tone that of a parent explaining that two plus two equals four to an over-emotional child, “because you _will be_ getting in that bath, dear. I’ve never seen a pair of boys quite as filthy as you two, and that’s coming from a mother of four.” She held her basket out to Ace, who dropped his shirt and socks into it with a tuneless hum. “I’m quite happy to leave the basket here and collect once you’re hidden in bubbles if you prefer, don’t get me wrong… But you aren’t going another day without cleaning up properly – you’ll start decaying before me, at this rate!”

She snorted at her own joke, not caring that Deuce only stared at her, open-mouthed.

“And—hang on—” Oh, he _hoped_ that the problem he had just noticed wasn't going unmissed by them; he thought he might just drop dead with the shame of it if he was right. “There's only one tub.”

“Yeah?” Ace answered instead of Madam Malva, struggling with the button on his shorts and confirming Deuce’s horrified suspicions, “so?”

“So—” Deuce mouthed wordlessly at Ace before landing on, “I’ll leave, I’ll come back when you’re done—”

“But there’s plenty of room for us both,” Ace said brightly, turning a smile so innocent onto Deuce that he floundered for words again, dazed, “so we can conserve water and time if we sit back-to-back, don’t worry.”

Wasting water was definitely not where Deuce’s concerns lay right now, and despite his hunger, he could bear the extra handful of minutes it would take Ace to scrub himself alone. He was starting to develop a throbbing headache, the exasperation driving nails right through his skull.

“I'm not getting in a bath with you,” Deuce said bluntly, crossing his arms over his chest, questioning whether he should zip up his jacket too, just to prove his point.

Ace gave him a concerned look, furthering the illusion that somehow _he_ was the crazy one here. “Why not?” He asked, apparently deaf to the scathing sound Deuce made. “You got in the sea with me.”

“How's that—that's not—that isn't comparable!” Deuce spluttered, his mortification deepening when Ace shrugged off his shorts, leaving him in just his underwear—of which he slid his thumbs between hips and waistband, only stopping from yanking them down too when Deuce hurriedly added, “wait, wait, stop, just—wait a—”

“I used to bathe with my brother all the time. That’s totally normal, isn’t it?” Ace said cheerfully, rocking on the balls of his feet and handing his shorts to Madam Malva, who nodded. “Right! So why're you making such a—”

“I'm not your brother!” Deuce snapped, incredulous. “ _Please_ tell me you can see how this is different to bathing with your brother?” And no, as far as he was concerned, bathing was something done alone, preferably behind a locked door.

Ace screwed up his freckled face in concentration, puffing his cheeks out in a manner that Deuce was almost convinced was intended as mocking his reservations. Even Madam Malva tittered with a giggle, still very much there and still very much not seeming the slightest bit bothered by Ace's evolving state of undress.

“Not really,” Ace shrugged, and Deuce was utterly done with this. That was, until Ace added, “besides, it's normal where I'm from to share baths. We couldn't afford to waste any water, so we would often pile in together where we could, especially when Luffy and I got older and stopped using the oil drums.” He inclined his head to the side just _so_ as he seemed to realize something from his own words, and something similar to pity but _warmer_ softened his eyes when he smiled at Deuce. “Although, I guess you never did anything like that with your family, did you?”

No, he had not. The thought of being seen, never mind in close proximity to another family member while naked, was horrifying to Deuce, and was not something that he even wanted to try to imagine doing. It was all very well for Ace, who was close to his brother and had grown up in an environment where bodies were just bodies and skin wasn't shameful, to be perfectly at ease with stripping off in front of others... But Deuce could only stutter his distress, glaring at his boots—

—in sudden anger not at Ace, nor at Madam Malva, but at himself. At his rigid mindset. At his assumption, so like his father's still, that this couldn't be innocent, couldn't be born from customs different to his own that were not inherently _wrong_ just for being the other side of the same coin... Even Madam Malva in her assumption that this wasn’t asking for a miracle, but rather something in keeping with their usual day to day lives – could it not be that that, to her, was as banal and bland a request as asking someone to remove their shoes before stepping onto clean carpet? Could it not be possible that to her, in her own personal cultural sphere, she wasn't asking anything unusual or invasive?

And so, refusing to meet their eyes – swallowing down his pride and his terror at breaking one of the most fundamental of his own social taboos – Deuce shrugged off his jacket, wishing not for the first time that he had been born into a family where simply being human wasn't a sin.

* * *

However, for all of his sudden rush of acceptance and determination to be a little more _Ace_ , Deuce found himself losing his nerve when the moment to cross the border from clothed to bare came. Maybe it was because Madam Malva had busied herself locating a pair of thick fluffy towels in that cupboard of hers, or perhaps it was more to do with Ace suddenly stripping off his own sandy boxers with no hesitancy, but Deuce hadn't been able to breach that inbuilt, iron-clad rule of preserving one's dignity. Not entirely.

Instead, he had got as far as toeing off his boots and socks before looking up, intent only on answering Madam Malva's question of whether they wanted the bottle of conditioner as well as the shampoo, and instead quite completely losing his shit at the sight of Ace slinging a leg over the side of the tub.

In hindsight – before he had yelped in stuttered panic, letting go of his belt and thus getting his ankles tangled in his loose pants – this whole stupid venture was doomed to fail right from the start. Of course he couldn't be expected to be comfortable with getting in a fucking bath with Ace like some kind of little kid – he'd only just grown comfortable enough with being used as a human pillow in his sleep by him to not wake up screaming anymore, after all, so expecting this leap into the insane and casually intimate to go without incident had been nothing more than a moment of naïve and wishful thinking.

So instead of playing happy bath times with Ace, Deuce now sat on the little wooden chair that creaked when he moved, towel wrapped around himself in some kind of attempt at modesty, watching Ace scoop handfuls of bubbles up and blowing them at him, falling short by at least a foot each time. Leaving hadn't been an option, his own stubbornness had insisted – going back to their room and waiting for Ace to come get him once he was finished felt, to Deuce, like total defeat rather than simply letting his nerves win a round in this ongoing battle.

So he stayed, shivering in his state of undress with the towel secured around his hips, feeling an unnecessary twinge of worry when Ace sucked in a deep breath and slid under the bubbles until only his bent knees were visible. That water couldn't harm him and render him immobile; Madam Malva had confirmed so without probing into why Deuce wanted to know, but the memories of having to fish Ace out of the sea weren't ones that Deuce was able to shake easily.

“I'm sorry,” Deuce apologized for what had to be the fourth time when Ace resurfaced, wiping the water out of his eyes, “for freaking out before.”

“I've already said it's fine,” Ace gasped for breath, running his fingers through his tangled hair and offering Deuce a gentle smile, “you don't need to keep apologizing. It should be me – and Madam Malva, actually – apologizing to _you_ ; we didn't consider your feelings. I don't know about her, but to me, it was like, 'oh its fine, we're captain and first mate, we've survived Sixis together, I don't care what he sees anymore'.”

“So modest,” Deuce snorted, his heart twisting fiercely in response to Ace's toothy grin. “Would you have cared even if that hadn’t been the case?”

Ace considered this, then said, “nope, probably not.”

Because of course he didn't, and of course he shouldn't.

“I want to be more open and relaxed about these sorts of things,” Deuce admitted, meeting Ace's inquiring stare, “because I think your way of thinking’s right, when all's said and done. I don't really believe there's anything wrong with...” he gestured vaguely to Ace, bubbles up to his armpits in the gigantic tub, not giving a single fuck that he was naked in front of someone else. “But where I come from, it's...”

“Yeah, I get it,” Ace filled the silence when Deuce trailed off, “I think, anyway. Your family don't sound very nice, if you don't mind me saying so.” Deuce shook his head, wholeheartedly agreeing with him. “Not because of this as such, but just the whole…” He waved his arms in a broad, vague gesture, sending droplets flying from his fingertips. “After everything you've told me about your dad and brother, I kinda wish I'd met you sooner and taken you away from all that.”

That would have been nice. That would have been _wonderful_ to break free and travel the world with Ace sooner, or even to just be with him, live with him, dedicate his life to his kind heart somewhere static and safe from ridicule and blame.

... Something that Ace would probably never allow himself to be rid of, given his circumstances. Something that Ace would carry with him wherever he went, whoever he encountered, his demons ringing in his ears and spelling lies of hatred and deception in response to—Deuce swallowed, throat constricting at the memory of his declaration that morning—in response to anyone pledging their loyalty and life to him.

Was that right? Was his sudden moment of understanding something that was true, or something only that dwelled in assumptions and anxiety? Ace, who was selfless, loving, brilliant—Ace, who perhaps could not envision a way of saving himself from his nightmares, who lamented not being around to give Deuce a way out before washing up destitute on Sixis—would he, when presented the undeniable chance, allow himself to recognize love and care for _him?_

Deuce didn't know, but now that the thought was there, it bothered him. Perhaps Ace had brushed off his confession back then as something lesser than Deuce pouring his very heart and soul into his words—

—But he was getting well and truly ahead of himself now, thoughts running and leaping into extremes when really, in this moment, all that mattered was Ace blinking at him, smile unsure in Deuce's ruminating silence.

“You okay?” Ace asked, searching his face. “Thinking about difficult things again?”

He couldn't tell him. Even if he had wanted to, how could he put into words the sympathy and urge to take care of something that Ace clearly didn't want to address? So Deuce shrugged, jerking his head awkwardly in something halfway between a shake and a nod.

“Just thinking about what we should do once we're cleaned up,” he said, deliberately veering away from the sentimental and stupid notions that swelled up in his heart; for just as Ace regretted being unable to save Deuce from misery sooner, Deuce _very_ much regretted not being able to do the impossible and change Ace's entire parentage, never mind whisking him away from some cold, callous upbringing. “Are you going to wash your hair, by the way? You asked for the conditioner too, but I don't see you making any use of either yet.”

It had been a throwaway sentence to tear himself off the tracks of a collapsed railroad, the end visible as a short sudden stop that spelled indescribable pain on impact. He had grasped for something – anything – insignificant to focus on, to draw Ace's attention to, and move on past dwelling on inevitables and hopelessness that he had no control over.

What Deuce didn't expect to happen was for Ace to pluck the shampoo bottle from the side of the bath and hold it out to him, his entire expression shining with something impossibly soft and gentle and so very, very out of place.

“Would you do it?” Ace asked, his voice every bit as delicate as the droplets that clung to his lashes, tiny diamonds on threads of lace. A small smile tugged at the freckles, softening his features further, and he added, “you can't be expected to let go of a lifetime of loneliness in the space of a week, Deuce. It wasn't fair of me to treat you with the same casualness as I would Luffy. So please,” with a flick of his wrist he swung the bottle closer, a pendulum between them, “let me help you take little steps; let's build on what we've already achieved. What do you say? Is that something you'd be happy to let me do?”

Yes, it was. When all was said and done, learning how to be open and so much _more_ with Ace was precisely what Deuce wanted, what Deuce was eager to work toward. To not be owned and shackled by the loneliness that turned darker, sourer, in the presence of other people as opposed to being alone. To be, if possible, one with his never-ending desire to be _better_ for Ace, to improve and to exist solely with the single-minded purpose of living for him.

It was a love language that Deuce, even in light of their time on Sixis, had still yet to perfect, had still yet to achieve fluency in... and whatever steps there were to take – however they presented; even offered to him in the form of a bottle taken with an uncertain smile – he would climb them one by one. Learning. Trusting. Believing in something better than the doubt he left to fester and decay at the bottom of those steps.

Ace was his lighthouse beacon; his guiding light illuminating his path, saving him from the perils of leviathans of doubt in the deep who would consume, the jagged edges of alienation that sought to tear him apart.

And if the next step above him presented itself in the disguise of dragging his chair round to the head of the bath, matching Ace's encouraging smile up at him, popping open the cap of the bottle—

—then Deuce would gladly embrace it.

“That's it,” Ace said reassuringly, settling back. “This'll be the first time you've washed someone else's hair, right?”

“Right,” Deuce said, “but how hard can it be?”

How hard could it be to reach out, to willingly slide his fingers into Ace's hair, to thumb circles to temples and caress touches to skin?

Surprisingly, the answer was _easier than you think_. Though the nerves were still very much present on instructing Ace to tilt his head back and brace for the chilled shampoo, they felt somewhat dulled in comparison to what his past experiences had led him to believe he would suffer. Maybe it was off the back of being cuddled on a nightly basis, or (more likely) working through the fishing ordeal day in, day out—but Deuce didn't feel the rise of a bubble of panic as he worked his fingers into Ace's wet hair, careful not to tug on any of the numerous tangles he found.

And that in itself was an achievement however he looked at it. The pride in himself flushed out into warmth at his cheeks, a smile invisible to Ace, who was warm – impossibly, fantastically warm under Deuce's fingers.

The contrast with the shenanigans of just a few mere moments ago rendered Deuce dizzy, the switch and change in atmosphere positively humorous.

“I've been wondering,” Ace spoke after a few minutes of relaxed silence punctuated only by his content sighs, “and feel free to tell me to shut up if you don't want to talk about this, but... since you've pledged your undying loyalty to me...” He hummed a pleased little sound, interrupting himself, as Deuce massaged the suds into the base of his skull. “Will you tell me your birth name now?” Ace asked hopefully, almost shyly, like he was embarrassed by his need to know.

It caught Deuce unaware, that question did, and with the surprise came the flustered disquiet, the loss of calm, the slip of his fingers through the soap to scratch Ace's scalp.

“Sorry, sorry,” Deuce said quickly, rubbing gentle touches where surely now stung, confident that he hadn't broken the skin. He inhaled a shaky breath, trying to untangle his racing thoughts as much as the knot he'd found in Ace's hair. Eventually, he settled on a terse, “you don't need to know that,” because it was the truth. Ace didn't need to know anything about who Deuce had left behind, who Deuce no longer was. “I am who you made me, Ace, and nothing else.”

But Ace didn't seem to agree, most distressingly.

“Well, no, I guess I don't _need_ to know it,” he said slowly, picking his words carefully, “but can I not _want_ to know it?” He paused as if waiting for Deuce's response, leaning back into his touch with a gentle press. When Deuce didn't respond, his mouth dry and lips pursed together to deny himself the chance to give in to Ace's fancy, Ace continued. “Can I not want to know everything about you, even the bits you yourself may not like? I could love those bits of you in your stead... Not to brag, but I'm kinda good at doing that.”

Deuce already knew this; already knew of Ace's ability to see the good in everything that Deuce had so far offered him, taking the positive and concentrating on that where Deuce had only ever focused on what he lacked rather than what he was able to provide.

Yet it still caught him off guard in the shape of a gasp that choked him, saw him coughing into his elbow and knocking the (thankfully closed) bottle of shampoo off the side of the bath. The open, honest offer for the boy of the past, still trapped in his mansion, to be loved... now there was a thought.

“Well, the same goes for you,” Deuce said far too quickly, misdirecting Ace's focus to reflect back at himself. “I want to know all there is to know about you, too.” Ah, that was too raw, too honest, too close to the heart in this situation where there was no Striker to board, no sea breeze, just Ace cradled in his hands, impossibly precious. “As your first mate, I think it's important to know everything.”

“As first mate, huh? Not as friends?” Ace teased, a twinkle in his eye as he tilted back, smiling up at Deuce.

“I—” Deuce bit his lip, distracting himself from the word _friends_ by plucking up the water jug from the side table. Running it under the sink tap to get clean water (and not daring to lean across Ace to access the bath's taps), Deuce reluctantly reminded him, “you're the first friend I've ever really had, like I said this morning... So all of this is still kind of difficult.” His fingers skimmed through the thoroughly worked in suds, their touch encouraging Ace's head back as if more by mere wish than direction. “Close your eyes, I'm going to rinse your hair.”

Doing as he was asked, Ace was quiet as Deuce poured the jug of water over his hair, working out the shampoo with one hand. Once the jug was emptied and Deuce was leaning back over to the sink to refill, Ace asked, “what else do you want to know about me?” so tenderly, so delicately, that Deuce couldn't help but meet his eyes, puzzled.

_I'll answer if I can. You'll know if I cannot._

But what was there left in Ace's past that could rival the reveal of Roger's bloodline?

Ace's skin was warm on touching the thick lettering of his tattoo, Deuce emboldened by a surge of righteous outrage on Ace's behalf at the thought of all he had had to have suffered thanks to Roger and his memory.

Faintly tracing over the cross through the S of the tattoo, Deuce, strangely unfazed by the contact where normally he would have been recoiling from such direct action, murmured, “I've got a feeling this wasn't a mistake. I can't imagine a tattoo artist would be able to mess up such a simple name as yours, nor would you have let them get away with it.”

“Ah,” Ace breathed, and interestingly, whatever tension he had held in his shoulders seemed to dissolve with the touch, caused him to relax and slide an inch or so further under the thick blanket of bubbles. “Sorry Deuce, but that's a long, sad story.” Deuce didn't even flinch when Ace laid his hand over the top of his, sealing them down, hiding the S from sight completely. “I'd rather not talk about that right now, if you don't mind. I'm enjoying myself too much to be bringing up bad memories.”

It wasn't a rejection, nor was his curiosity being shut down and punished for existing. This was very clearly a promise, albeit a difficult one, to revisit this topic later when Ace could give it the full attention it sounded like it deserved. Though this only served to pique Deuce's interest in the crossed-out letter further, he didn't press the matter, offering a smile when Ace met his eyes, pain warring with something _softer_ there all of a sudden.

“Ace,” Deuce began, intent on offering comfort for something he didn't understand, the half-formed plan to assure his captain that whatever had happened, he wouldn't judge him—but Ace cut him off with a pat to his hand, indicating for Deuce to remove it.

“Hold that thought,” said Ace brightly, and, with a deep inhale, he slid down into the water again, knees bending, submerging himself entirely under the bubbles and completely undoing the good the clean water had done.

Sighing, grudgingly marveling at Ace's great escape, Deuce took the moment to snatch up the bottle of conditioner and squeeze a healthy amount into his palm, ready to tackle Ace's hair again when he resurfaced. Ace's knees, Deuce vaguely noted, also bore smatterings of freckles across them that trailed in random patterns up his thighs before becoming lost under the bubbles.

No, Deuce really couldn't fault Ace for wanting to stay away from difficult, heavy topics right now... Because despite the humiliation of the entire scene - and the groan of maddening embarrassment when he realized that they would once again find themselves in a ridiculous, compromising routine that would probably include a lot of wailing on his part once Ace was ready to get out of the bath...

Deuce himself couldn't help but grin, flushing with happiness.

* * *

As it turned out, he needn't have worried about losing his head again and making a complete fool of himself. Once the conditioner had been rubbed in and subsequently rinsed out (without any further incidences of Ace getting his hair thick with bubbles), they had meandered around the topic of the night's plans for a few minutes before Ace had told Deuce to close his eyes, preserving what little sanity he felt he still had a grasp on.

Shouting over the tumult of noise caused by Ace's rise from the bathwater, Deuce had distracted himself from thinking about what was happening right in front of him by narrating what he hoped to do that afternoon. First, food. Wait, no—first, dry off and get dressed. Allocate beds. Check on his copy of Brag Men out of habit, worried that it might have somehow become damaged during their journey.

(He thought he had heard Ace huff a laugh at this – was ready to defend his right to obsess over his most treasured possession should the need arise – but Ace said nothing on the matter, only prompting him with a simple, “and then what?” when Deuce paused, listening.)

It also proved incredibly difficult to keep his eyes closed when Ace went, “oops!” followed by a laugh and the clatter of something heavy. The moment when Ace had swung his leg into the bath was unhelpfully recalled in vivid detail, seemingly just for the sake of torturing Deuce further, leading to him smacking a palm to his forehead repeatedly in a desperate attempt to beat it out of his thoughts, almost.

But then Ace was gone with a flutter of warm fingers to the top of Deuce's head, promising he would be waiting in the bedroom for him. It was only then that Deuce opened his eyes, just managing to catch the sight of the white towel fastened around Ace's hips before he closed the bathroom door behind him, leaving Deuce alone. The offer to wash Deuce's hair in return had of course been put forward, but Deuce had declined, feeling it better for his heart to have a moment's privacy to stew and mull over everything that had happened so far that day, rather than subjecting himself to far more intimacy than he was currently equipped to deal with in one go.

The warm bath had been welcomed with a groan that, under normal circumstances where baths and showers had been aplenty for the last two weeks, would have been viewed as dramatic and exaggerated. But to Deuce, who had never foregone washing for any length of time before, it was welcomed back in the form of incessant, excessive scrubbing and not one, not two, but three rounds of shampooing (which, even he could admit, might have been a bit much).

It was also a relief to be able to remove the mask at long last, something that he hadn't done for more than a handful of seconds on Sixis. Contemplating washing that too, he eventually decided against it, not keen on the idea of having a wet mask slapped over his eyes when he realized it wouldn't dry in time to see Ace again. Maybe one day he'd look into getting a spare, assuming he could ever find a place that sold exactly the same make as the one he had favored for its simplicity.

The intrusive thought of _maybe one day you won't feel you have to wear one around Ace at all_ was wiped away with the condensation clinging to the tiny wall mirror, Deuce having finally found the energy to haul himself out of the bath after at least 10 minutes of simply staring at the ceiling in a kind of mentally overwhelmed stupor.

That was too much to be working with right now, he acknowledged on examining his bare face, frowning at his reflection. There was every possibility that one day, somehow, Ace would see what lay below the mask through deliberate decision and the will to reveal that last piece of the puzzle. One day, maybe, he might even give him his birth name, willingly handing over the key to the locked door and inviting Ace to open and to judge.

But right now, frowning at himself as if to challenge his reflection to speak and defy his choices, Deuce couldn't see that happening. Trust Ace as he did, this wasn't really a matter of faith in his captain nor in the confidence that nothing would change between them should the event ever arise – he didn't want that man from pre-Sixis to exist anymore, and the mask was the signature written into the death certificate that kept him down and silent under memory and past.

“Ace only needs to know Deuce,” he whispered to his reflection, watching it closely, noting the faint hint of freckles under his eyes that were usually hidden by the mask. “He doesn't need to know _you_.”

_Even if he wants to._

_Even if I want him to._

_Even if, given the choice, he_ would _be the one I would share you with._

And that settled the matter, as far as Deuce was concerned.

After toweling his hair as dry as he could get it and then securing the towel around his hips, Deuce replaced the mask back over his eyes and left the steamy bathroom. Madam Malva was nowhere to be seen, though Deuce could hear her booming voice coming from the floor below. She had said that they were in room 12, which had amused Deuce greatly, and he found it with relative ease at the end of the long, narrow corridor, curiously opposite room 14 rather than 13. Smiling slightly at the assumption of adherence to superstition, Deuce tried the door handle. Finding it unlocked, he knocked lightly to announce himself lest he walk in on Ace completely naked once again, keen to avoid such a situation.

“Ace?” He said over the creak of the white door. “You decent?”

“Yeah,” came Ace's complete and utter lie, for when Deuce swung the door open fully, Ace was only dressed in a pair of violently orange boxers and sprawled out on the bed—

—which demanded the entirety of Deuce's attention, stopping him mid-moan about Ace's apparent inability to put on the fresh new clothes that were neatly piled on the green wicker chair in the corner of the room.

Because there was only one bed. One single bed, intended for one single person – that being Ace at the moment.

That being Ace, who didn't seem at all bothered, worried, or concerned by the lack of the promised second bed, smiling sleepily at Deuce as if he had been drifting off during the peace and quiet.

Which was now aptly ruined, given how Deuce had begun to conjure too many questions that ran into each other in his mind, crashing and colliding as his last wisps of patience took off and abandoned him, perhaps regarding him fondly as he slammed the door shut, hands on hips.

“This has to be the wrong room,” he stated, not caring for Ace's appraising, searching stare roaming over his abdomen right now. “That's a single bed.”

“Uh-huh,” Ace agreed, “but this is definitely the right one. Madam Malva let me in after I went to fetch her from the bar, and it’s the one she slung our bags into earlier; she left the key on the window sill, look – and there’s your bag on top of mine, see?”

The fact that Ace had presented at the front of the inn in nothing but a towel was ignored, the second-hand embarrassment for his captain's lack of modesty something that Deuce could deal with later.

“We booked a twin room.”

“Yeah, we did, but she did also say this was the last room available,” Ace pointed out fairly, which Deuce didn't think was at all acceptable. Where was Ace's rage? His indignation? Because to him, Ace didn't seem to care in the slightest that they were short a bed. Sitting up, Ace continued, “I already asked, so stop looking so mad – she said she was really sorry and she'd understand if we wanna go someplace else, but this is all that's left. She said she hadn't been fully concentrating earlier when she was talkin' to Cari, and the whole bed situation slipped her notice or somethin’. I thought it'd be kinda mean to be like, 'thanks for taking care of us, but we'll be fucking off now, bye'... Don't you think?”

Well, yes, in principle, Deuce agreed wholeheartedly. His headache, however, was threatening to return, and he massaged his temples between forefinger and thumb with a long, heavy sigh.

“This inn is a lion short of a circus,” Deuce muttered angrily, glaring at Ace and focusing on a matter that he _could_ fix instead, ignoring the bed fiasco for just a moment. “Why aren't you dressed, anyway?”

“Well, Madam Malva brought us two sets of clothes,” Ace chirped, nodding at the folded clothes on the seat, “and I didn't know what you'd want to wear, so I thought I'd wait and see which you'd prefer first rather than leaving you with second choice.” Oh. That softened Deuce's heart a little, made him tuck his hair behind his ear for something to do when Ace grinned at him, radiant. “But I chose the orange underpants,” he added, needlessly gesturing at his crotch, “I didn't think that'd matter. I left you the black pair.” He snorted with laughter. “I've never worn another guy's underwear before – gotta love Madam Malva, huh?”

“Rather that than being forced to hide in here until our clothes dry,” Deuce countered, plucking up the remaining pair with distain. He _really_ didn't want to imagine who had been wearing these last, or when; at least they could be sure it hadn't been Madam Malva herself, thankfully. “Close your eyes and—I don't know—put the pillow over your face or something; I'm going to get changed.” He hesitated when Ace didn't move, still pinning him with the same brilliantly bright grin, and Deuce frowned at him, prickling uncomfortably as he felt himself heat up, painfully, viscerally aware of Ace's eyes skimming along his skin almost as if his gaze were a fluttering touch. “What?”

“Nothin',” Ace said easily, rolling onto his stomach with one last flash of that smile over his shoulder, “just admiring your sunburn.”

If nothing else, Deuce was glad that the issue of Ace's tattoo hadn't carried over from the bath. Seeming perfectly at ease with the world, Ace planted his face into the pillow with a soft _thump_ and, for good measure, tucked his hands under it to press the sides to his ears, too.

On some level Deuce really wanted to try again, to be obstinate and selfish, to pry and pick at Ace's secret. It tantalized him, he admitted freely to himself on pulling up the underwear with a dark shudder, knowing that there was something waiting to be learned about the only person he cared about and yet not having that permission to study it in obsessive depth. It would come – Ace had promised that it would – but when? How? What could happen to get Ace into the kind of mood that would allow for spilling secrets from his past, when Deuce himself refused point blank to return the favor in kind? He had no idea, and, though he could see just how selfish he was being right now, it still didn't help quell that need within him.

So, Deuce was therefore infinitely glad when Ace piped up to distract him, shutting down his internal dilemma of trying to figure out how to phrase the question once again.

“We'll need to get a new map from somewhere,” Ace said, voice muffled into the pillow, “and plan our route onwards in the morning.”

“Right,” Deuce agreed, pulling on one of the shirts at random and buttoning it up, watching Ace's feet kick arcs through the air as he swung them in a manner reminiscent of a child.

“And,” Ace said before Deuce could offer anything useful, “we need a boat. A proper boat that we can sleep in and live in.”

Deuce frowned at him, pausing on the last button, before belatedly remembering that Ace couldn't see him. “How does one even go about getting a boat?” He'd never thought about it – he'd never thought about a lot of things that Ace seemed to have put a great amount of time and effort into, for that matter.

“I haven't figured that out yet,” Ace admitted, though he didn't sound crestfallen by this revelation, but rather excited to find out the _how_ and the _where_ , “but I'm sure it won't be that hard.”

Deuce didn't argue, hopping on one foot to tug a pair of pants up that looked like they'd be too long and roomy for him. “And the bed situation?” He veered off course without thought, reminded by it by Ace sitting up abruptly, clearly thinking that the coast was clear in light of the clinking of Deuce's belt. “What're we going to do? We can't both fit in that; it's tiny. You by yourself barely have room to—”

Ace's grin – soft, searching, _starved_ of something that Deuce didn't like to even attempt to imagine – shut him up immediately, leaving him quite literally choking on his words in an awkward sort of splutter that morphed into a cough.

“ _What?”_ Deuce demanded immediately, thumb slipping on his belt under that look. “You think we can?”

“No,” Ace said mildly, that expression refusing to drop, Deuce's heart, in response, declining to simmer back down to something closer to normal than its current maddening dance, “but I was going to say I'll sleep in the chair and you can have the bed, seeing as we don't need to cuddle anymore... It won't be freezing at night in here, so...”

It was like the fire burning in his chest had been dowsed with icy water without warning, leaving Deuce breathless with shock, frozen midway through putting on his second sock, gaping at Ace. He hadn't considered that. He had assumed, most humiliatingly, that their ritual would continue, that somehow, oddly enough, it had never been just about heat and warmth and ensuring his comfort, but also carried a vein of intimacy that he couldn't correctly label. A dependency on one-another that wasn't solely about survival; a bond that grew and budded into life once Deuce had stopped flailing and screaming when waking with Ace entwined around him.

“I'll take the chair,” Deuce settled on, convinced that he was red all the way down to his chest, “you don't need to—I'll be perfectly fine there—I didn't mean I _wanted_ to share,” he said in a rush, finding the strength to look up imploringly at Ace – and then wishing he hadn't, given that Ace just hummed in such a way that surely meant he didn't believe him at all. “It was force of habit – I don't _like_ touching people like that—” which was wrong – entirely wrong – but he still didn't know how to put the truth into words, really, still didn't know how to take that neglect and label it, nurture it, see it for what it really was and deal with it accordingly— “so I'm not _looking_ to sh-share a bed with you, that's not—”

“Hey,” Ace said gently, cutting Deuce off incredibly effectively, “relax. It's okay. I get it; I'll miss cuddling in the sand with you, too.” He snickered when Deuce threw the remaining clothes at him, offering his first mate a sunny smile. “We could always drop by the beach and roll around for a while if we miss it too much—”

“Don't,” Deuce groaned, snatching up the little flowery hairbrush that he assumed was another of Madam Malva's own, dragging it through his rapidly drying hair, “really, don't.” He tossed the brush to Ace when he gestured for it a moment later, realizing too late that perhaps he should have offered to brush Ace's hair, too.

Yet oddly, against his will, as he watched Ace run the brush through his hair with a pleased hum, Deuce couldn't help but feel distinctly, unpleasantly, hollow, as if warmth of vital importance really had been removed from his very bloodstream, rendering him cold, alone, and curiously adrift under a sea of black skies and infinite stars without anchor or ambition.

* * *

The clothes that Madam Malva had loaned to them were noticeably too large, lending them the comical look of a pair of boys in their daddy's work clothes. Ace, of course, had not buttoned up the stripy gray shirt (something that Cari, Deuce had noted with a cold stare, did not seem to disapprove of at all), but he had at least shoved the long sleeves up to his elbows to prevent them from flapping dangerously close to dipping into his drink.

Deuce fared no better, tweaking absently at the folds in his own pale green shirt and feeling inexplicably like he had been shrunk down a couple of sizes, somehow. The pants caught and twisted under his knees when he tried to cross his legs under the table Madam Malva had steered them to, and the socks rolled uncomfortably down his heels in his boots from years of being stretched out by feet far bigger than his.

Neither of them had wanted to ask Madam Malva directly about the owner of these clothes, but while getting changed in their room they had firmly concluded that they were relics of a past partner - probably a husband, potentially a boyfriend - who was no longer in Madam Malva's life. Ace, dramatically, had run with the narration and decided that this unknown man had been a fisherman who had perished in brutal hand to hand combat with a Sea King. Deuce personally didn't agree with something quite as violent as that, but he did have to admit that Ace's re-enactment of the legendary fight between man and beast with one of the pillows was hilarious.

From their little secluded stall beside the open window, Deuce watched the people outside milling around, laughing, shrieking, enjoying the gradually building and rising atmosphere brought in by the constant swell of the music. It reminded him of something from long ago - something that seemed like a dream, yet strangely felt just real enough to be a memory - and as much as he was perfectly happy sitting across from Ace and listening to him voice his wonder about _where_ Madam Malva had taken their clothes to dry, Deuce also couldn't deny he felt a creeping urge to go find the festival and perhaps jog that memory back out of the depths of his childhood.

Even Ace seemed to be restless waiting for their food, something that he'd so far managed to keep well-hidden and respectfully managed. Every thirty seconds or so he would glance hopefully in the direction of the kitchen doorway, perking up when either Cari or Jollie (and once, a woman who Deuce assumed to be the head chef, judging by her appearance) swung through it, laden with trays of drinks and food that was intended for other patrons.

“I'm dying, Deuce,” Ace finally gave in, deflating in his seat with a dramatic sigh, “I want that burger from the menu so bad...”

“And I'm sure it wants you just as much,” Deuce said, pressing a palm to his stomach in a miserable attempt at silencing its rumbling growl. Their midmorning snack now seemed so long ago, so pitiful and pathetic in comparison to the smell of sizzling meat from the kitchen, the sight of piles upon piles of delicious food wending its way around the inn.

“Let's make a promise right now,” Ace moaned, massaging his stomach, “to never, ever run low on supplies, no matter what else happens. The kitchen's always gonna be stocked, even if we have to sacrifice—I dunno—beer money.”

“Suits me just fine,” Deuce agreed, raising the tankard of mead that Madam Malva had handed to him towards Ace, offering a toast. “I've got a feeling I'm not going to enjoy this much.”

 _This_ being the mead - Deuce's first ever taste of mead, in fact. Madam Malva hadn't been interested in this bit of information when Deuce had spluttered it, pressing the pewter tankard into his hands with a rough assertion of, “a pirate's gotta at _least_ know what alcohol tastes like, sweetheart. Best to have your first taste somewhere safe rather than out there on the streets, hm?”

...Which, though almost grudgingly, Deuce did agree with.

But when Deuce drank following Ace knocking his own drink to his with a smile dancing in his eyes, he found himself surprised to not hate it. In fact, he would even go as far as to say he quite liked it. It had a warming effect - one that seeped first down through his stomach before carrying on to his fingertips and cheeks - and the longer he drank, the better it got. So much so that he at first didn't notice Ace setting his own drink down with something of a satisfied grin, watching Deuce closely.

“Good?” Ace asked in a would-be casual tone, dropping his chin into his palm when Deuce finally resurfaced. “You've given yourself a mustache, by the way.”

“It's not disgusting,” Deuce said in disbelief, wiping away the foamy mustache with one of the flowery napkins Cari had laid out. “I always thought it would be disgusting.”

“Aye, you're a proper sailor now,” Ace grinned, adopting a stereotypical sea-roughened twang, “proper pirate through and through!”

If that was all it took to become a pirate that knew what the fuck a pirate was supposed to do, then Deuce would damn well take it.

By the time Cari burst through the kitchen door bearing trays laden down with their meals, Deuce had finished off his drink and the two were deep in conversation about the highly engaging topic of how they were expected to pay for all of this. Shutting up abruptly when Cari deposited the trays, Deuce did his absolute best not to look guilty as all hell in light of the worrying information Ace had just disclosed, mind reeling with his captain's ringing laughter at their situation.

“Ahh, don't worry about getting those clothes dirty or anything,” Cari said consolingly, completely misreading Deuce's dreadful attempt at masking the horror of Ace's revelation, “Madam Malva won't mind. I'm still surprised she let you wear them, actually, but if she's okay with it then she'll also be okay with scrubbing them if you end up getting covered in your dinner.”

Deuce liked to think that even when as hungry as they were, they could still retain some semblance of manners and etiquette right now... although one look at Ace's eager expression as he dragged the enormous beef burger closer warned him that this might not be the case. Especially when Ace then squirted an obscene amount of sauce onto the patty, creating the illusion that his burger had just been brutally stabbed and was bleeding to death in its bun.

“Why's it surprising?” Deuce asked after hastily thanking Cari for the food, keen to draw his own attention away from Ace. “Whose are they? Her husband's?”

Cari pursed her lips, thinking. “They belong to the man she loves,” was her vague answer, “her husband died a long time ago.”

“They're two different people?” Ace asked around a mouthful of burger, asking the same question that Deuce was thinking. “Good for her, moving on; she deserves a lotta love.”

Cari frowned a little, as if determining how much she was allowed to say. “Yeah, they're two different people... It's complicated. Not because of her husband - he's been gone for, what, fifteen years? No, she and her partner've stopped talking off the back of this fight they had a while ago.”

“She broke up with her boyfriend?” Ace looked pained on Madam Malva's behalf. “What happened? She's really lovely; why would anyone get mad at her?”

But Cari didn't seem to want to discuss this further, shifting her trays in her hands and uncomfortably rocking her weight from foot to foot. Deuce rather got the impression that this separation wasn't the result of an argument over what to have for dinner one night.

“Thanks for our food, Cari,” Deuce cut in; relief flooded her pretty face, relaxing, “it looks amazing.”

It looked pretty _'amazing'_ smeared around Ace's lips too, although not with quite the same positive connotation.

“I'll add it to your tab,” Cari said brightly - then, after a moment's hesitation where she seemed to battle against the decision of whether to stay or leave, she said hurriedly to Ace, “and if you're going to the festival later, maybe I'll see you down there? I finish up here at five, so—if you want—just while you're visiting, we could maybe get a drink and watch the fireworks later?”

He had to admire her forwardness, especially when Ace, right at this moment, did not exactly portray himself as someone a nice young girl might ideally wish to date, given the ring of sauce around his mouth (which hung open in a disbelieving gape). He also didn't help his own case when he very obviously looked to Deuce for help or direction on what do to, receiving nothing but a raised eyebrow and the inability to quite meet his eyes.

And Deuce, against his own will - through the laugh at Ace's bewilderment that he held firm in his throat, not letting it surface - was overcome with the strangest sensation of something that felt painfully similar to jealousy. Not because _he_ wanted to be the one that Cari was asking out, no, that wasn't it... It was something darker, almost, something possessive that screamed inside him, clawing for him to speak up and snarl that Ace wasn't available for whisking away into the night. Something that felt deeply, painfully uncomfortable with the way that Cari fluttered her lashes at Ace, her cheeks high with color, lip bitten gently between her teeth in what she likely believed to be an alluring manner.

“Uh,” Ace said uselessly, and Deuce could _feel_ his gaze burning into him, wordlessly begging for him to come to his aid, “yeah, we'll be checking out the festival, of course... Dunno what the plan is other than that...” He kicked Deuce under the table in a desperate plea for help, but all Deuce could do under Cari's blazing spotlight was try to communicate _what do you want_ me _to do?_ through the minute widening of his eyes, the slightest twitch of his brows. “Uh... if we see you around, we'll say hi, I guess?”

All in all, Deuce thought Cari handled Ace's less than enthusiastic rejection rather well. Agreeing to _say hi_ should their paths so happen to cross later, she took their orders for more beers and turned on her heel, looking thoroughly disappointed and rather embarrassed. The meaner part of Deuce's heart felt smug and glad, taking vindictive pleasure in her dejected walk back to bar - which dissipated when Jollie, the other barmaid, patted her sympathetically on the arm before winding her own around Cari's shoulders.

“She was asking you out on a date,” Deuce said dispassionately, suddenly not all that hungry. “She likes you.”

“Dunno why,” Ace said, clearly astonished, as he turned back to shoveling food into his mouth until his cheeks were bulging, “she doesn't know anything about me. Oh my _god_ , Deuce, this food is fuckin' to _die_ for, you gotta try some!”

Deuce sighed through his nose, having no intention of explaining that Ace's general charisma and good looks were enough to attract any number of pretty girls. There were more pressing issues to attend to, such as the grand unveiling of their dire circumstances that Ace had happily announced right before Cari had arrived and slamming the brakes on Deuce's good mood.

“Forgetting that for a moment,” Deuce said, idly stabbing at one of his fries, “talk me through what you said before.”

“Which bit?” Ace asked thickly through the burger. “What?” He demanded, affronted, when Deuce only frowned at him. “You mean what I said about pacing yourself with the beer? I mean it dude, you need to take it easy on your first time drinking, else you'll end up collapsing in a ditch and professing your love to a sheep or something.”

Deuce couldn't help but quirk a reluctant, lopsided grin. “Speaking from experience?”

“Might be,” Ace said casually, reaching for a fistful of fries from the shared plate between them, “or it might have been a cow. Or a horse. Either way, my point still stands.”

But that hadn't been the problem. He'd had alcohol before, though it had been a glass of wine, and it had been in the presence of his extended family to adhere to social expectations. A pair of cousins - twin girls, a little younger than him - had snorted unkindly when he had sipped the wine and almost gagged, so he had then knocked the whole glass back in one to get it out of the way and gone, almost choking in the process. Admittedly, no, he hadn't foreseen the possibility of one of the passing servers his father had hired to promptly refill his glass and thus necessitate the ordeal once again, but that was quite beside the point.

No, the problem that had made Deuce's blood run cold had been—

“What did you mean when you said you don't have any money at all?”

Because surely Deuce had misunderstood something. There was no possible way Ace could have slipped something that important into their phatic, meandering chatter like it wasn't of enormous importance. There was no chance that Ace had lied earlier, because Ace _didn't_ lie, and Deuce's trust in him was unshakable and absolute to the point where he was sure he trusted Ace more than himself.

“Oh, that,” Ace said offhandedly through a mouthful of fries, “yeah, well, I was planning on doing this thing that my brother and I used to do, right, which is where you run off before paying for a meal - a dine n' dash.”

“I'm familiar with the concept,” Deuce said slowly, hating where this was going.

“Oh, good,” Ace said, looking relieved to not have to explain further, “well, I was intending for us to do that tomorrow after we've had a proper sleep and breakfast and whatever - we'd just take off, hop on the Striker, and go zooming onto the next island we like the look of.” He paused to draw breath, although with how he was still continuously cramming everything he could reach into his mouth, Ace gave the impression that he was inhaling his food rather than air. “Don't look at me like that,” he said, words barely intelligible, addressing Deuce's hard glare, “I've changed my mind, okay? Madam Malva's great and I really like her; I'm not gonna run out on her like that. If anything, I wanna give her a big tip as thanks for being good fun... So that brings me to the problem of having no cash. Go figure, huh?”

“But before, when we first arrived,” Deuce said desperately, this whole stupid problem not adding up or making sense, “you said you'd pay for everything because I lost all of my money - you said I didn't need to worry about it because you could afford it all—”

“No, no, no,” Ace laughed, airily waving a hand, “I said you didn't need to worry about money, and I had you covered.”

“Exactly!” Deuce said triumphantly, pointing at Ace. “You said—”

“—Nothing about actually _having_ any money.”

Deuce froze, expression stuck, mind working furiously to remember Ace's exact words. Was that right? Had Ace really specifically avoided confirming that he had enough money to pay for lodging and food? He couldn't remember, the memory a haze, lost to the intervening hours and nonsense they had put themselves through, baths and beds and all.

“You did that on purpose,” Deuce hissed, leaning in closer to avoid table number 7's curious stare, “you phrased it like that deliberately so I wouldn't pick up on it, and so you could then deny any accountability later on.”

“I would _never_ ,” Ace gasped in mock offence, eyes glittering with mischief.

“That's a dirty trick to play,” Deuce growled, but Ace simply shrugged, helping himself to a slice of pizza.

“I wasn't tricking you,” he said, happily munching away, “that was never my intention. Think of it more like I was breaking you in easily, okay? A pirate's life is different to what you're used to; you would have got all huffy if I'd told you the plan right off the bat—”

“So instead you thought I'd accept it more graciously while running away from a screaming innkeeper?”

Ace paused mid-chew, frowning at Deuce in thought. “That's a good point,” he said seriously, “I didn't consider that.”

To the uneducated in the ways of Ace, it didn't sound like Ace had considered much, honestly speaking, but Deuce at least knew that wasn't really the case. If anything, an inordinate amount of thought had likely been put into this, accounting for behavior and beliefs alike that didn't match with his own. It was, in all honesty, probably exactly as Ace said, and knowing him as he did, once he calmed down enough to look at the situation through Ace's experienced eyes rather than his sheltered and coddled own, Deuce could see the logic.

Barely.

“I'd much rather you just tell me if you plan for us to do something stupid,” Deuce sighed. “We're meant to be in this together. I'll stand by whatever choices you make without question, Ace... provided you can offer satisfying rationale for any that sound ridiculous, obviously.”

But when Deuce glanced up from the fry he was twirling around and around on his plate, what he saw looking back at him made his heart stop, his chest seize.

Because Ace was regarding him tenderly. So tenderly, in fact, that he had stopped eating, a feat in itself that hadn't seemed at all possible just seconds prior. Had the world ended around them, Deuce felt that that wouldn't have been enough to shake Ace's gaze, to obstruct the affection rolling off him in great waves. Which bit had affected him so deeply? The declaration to stand by him through any and all choices? But Ace knew that Deuce would do that for him... didn't he? Had he not been explicit enough on Sixis, declaring that to live without Ace was unthinkable?

Regardless, Deuce felt hot all of a sudden, yet he couldn't seem to tear his eyes from Ace's. With that effect in place, guided into shallow breaths and a fluttering heartbeat to the shirt of a man he had never met, Deuce swallowed thickly, said, “we're in this together, Ace. Don't go doing things on your own anymore, okay? Consult me. _Use_ me. It's part of my role to be your go-to when making all important decisions, isn't it?” Deuce quirked a smug grin as Ace's eyes widened at having his own words thrown back at him. “I remember _that_ line pretty clearly.”

_Word for word, imprinted into my soul._

_Useful. Needed._

_By him._

It seemed a little silly and hyperbolic to be allowing his heart to twist as it did, the situation barely calling for anything emotionally driven or any declarations of lasting allegiance, taking a knee in a bow for who he pledged his life to... and yet it came worryingly easily, the words like silk on his tongue, flowing as water over lips that sought not to contain their meaning, their devotion, but to let it run, flow, drown.

His only regret in allowing this feeling to build and crest was the fact that his notebook was upstairs, buried in his and Ace's belongings, of no use to the myriad of prose that colored his mind so.

Ace's heaved sigh broke the tension, popping their rainbow soap bubble with a bite into his pizza. “Right, yeah, so like I was saying—” oh, was he _embarrassed?_ Was that a flush of pink hiding obscured underneath his freckles, his tan? “—now we face the problem of not having any way of paying Madam Malva.”

“What will we have to do?” Deuce asked, at last allowing himself to eat. And oh, what a _treat_ that was! What had he been holding back on, too preoccupied with Ace to succumb to _this?_ Because the fries - plain and simple fries, cooked in oil and sprinkled with salt - were easily the best Deuce had ever tasted. “These are _good_ ,” he groaned before Ace could answer, stuffing more into his mouth while willing himself not to moan theatrically and gain the attention of literally everyone in the inn, “ _shit_ these are good—”

Ace's giggle was light and melodic, warm and comforting. “We'll rob a rich-looking guy. Or two, depending. There's probably gonna be a fair few around for the festival, so it'd be a good chance to build up some cash we can take to the next place, too.”

Deuce struggled to swallow, eyes going wide. “You're kidding.”

“Nope,” Ace grinned.

“We're really going to steal from people?”

“That's kinda the pirate way, isn't it? Fuck the rich, be humble with the poor; c'mon, you must know the drill.”

Of course he did, naturally - he had heard of plenty of pirate-led robberies in his time - but still.

“That's sort of exciting,” Deuce breathed, cheeks full to aching point, “I've never done anything like that before.”

“We,” Ace said in a low voice, his gray eyes practically sparkling with fervor, with chaotic energy like the sea herself, “are gonna have a fuckin' good night tonight, Deuce. I'm gonna show you how to dance in the streets - how to live every moment of your life without regrets from now on.”

And he believed him. Oh, did he ever believe him.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I promise there's a plot... honest.
> 
> Just FYI, I'm in the process of moving house at the moment! I'm hoping to move this month, which means writing time during December and January is going to be extremely limited as I pack, move, and unpack (and decorate. Oh my god, there will be... so much to do...). All I want to do right now is write the next chapter; but sadly, life is demanding that I Adult first and pack. So if anyone notices my absence from posting fics over the next couple of months, this is why ;__; I'll do my best, though, because I love this fic, even if it is stupidly wordy ♥
> 
> I love chatting, so feel free to send me a message on either [Tumblr](https://chromiwrites.tumblr.com/) or [Twitter](https://twitter.com/Chromiwrites)! I'm always open to requests and chatting about these guys!


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